


The Red String.

by withoutwords



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Artist!Aaron, First Meetings, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, High School, Kid Fic, M/M, Pining, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Soulmates, Strong Language, single dads
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-15
Updated: 2016-09-19
Packaged: 2018-08-15 04:11:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 21,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8042125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutwords/pseuds/withoutwords
Summary: A collection of AU stories I wrote on Tumblr.





	1. the high school jock/nerd au.

**Author's Note:**

> Finn really wants the fit, footie mad, Aaron Dingle to notice him. 
> 
> Robert just wants to go home.

Robert’s got a gaping hole in the collar of his school shirt, _and_ he forgot to bring his lunch, _and_ he just got out of Mr Howard’s geography class where he’d had to sit a surprise test. It was only Monday.

“Sod this sodding day,” he says, lamenting, as he slumps down next to Vic in the library. It’s mostly quiet, just the usual crowds poring over their books or tittering over their phones. Maybe he could lie his way into just staying here for the rest of the afternoon.

“Oh, hi, brother dearest, I’m good thanks,” Vic teases, slamming her text shut only to drag another one over. “Would ask how ya are but ya face kinda gave it away, ‘n’all.”

“I’m sorry, is my infinite suffering and eventual demise not serious enough for ya? Should I go and flush my own head down the toilet, just to get some sympathy?”

“Oh no one’s ever done that to you, don’t be such a big b - ”

“It’s happening.” Vic’s best mate, Finn, squeaks as he throws his bag down on the table. He’s hunched over and hissing like half the room didn’t just see him flail in any way. Robert rolls his eyes. “He looked at me.”

Vic scrunches up her nose. “Who, Aaron?”

“The very same.”

"Dingle?” Robert can’t help but say with a scoff, and the very thought makes him grin like an idiot. He flicks his hair out of his face so he can peer at Finn better. There’s still a flush in his cheeks. “You can’t be serious.”

“No, I’m not, I’m havin’ a laugh – of course I’m serious!”

“Okay, well, was it a, I’m lookin’ at people so I don’t run into them look,” Vic says, humouring him. “Or a, I’m looking at you because I want to run into you look?”

“I don’t know!” Finn finally falls into a chair. He’s an okay kid, really, if a bit annoying – but his grasp on reality is fairly suspect. “Contrary to what you might think I don’t catalogue all his bloody expressions!”

Robert scoffs again, shaking his head. “What a joke.”

Vic says, “Robert!” at the same time Finn protests, “You’re good at numbers, Sugden, not people,” but Robert’s not listening. He’s caught sight of Aaron and his friends hovering near the library door.

“Here he comes now, why don’t we just ask him?”

There’s three of them, still in all their footy kit; the red and white stark against the dark backdrop of the library. Aaron’s hair is all fluffy, his skin a light pink, and Robert casts his eyes away because no. He won’t be that guy.

Aaron’s got half the school drooling all over him. Robert’s better than that.

“If you breathe a word of this, Robert, I swear.” Finn’s got his mouth twisted up, pushing his glasses to the top of his nose. “I’ll hit you so hard you won’t chew for a week.”

Robert can’t help the sudden bark of laughter, tipping up into his chair with his wheezing. He’s had plenty of threats against him in his time – usually from blokes bigger than him, trying to pay him to do their work – but that beats everything. He just shakes his head.

“Whatever, I need to go find this book.”

There’s no book. He just wanders aimlessly for a while in the hopes that he’ll see something he hasn’t seen yet. It’s unlikely, given how much time he spends in here – but he likes a challenge. And he doesn’t want to watch Finn embarrass himself more than he already has.

He’s an arsehole, not a monster.

“You’ve got a hole in your shirt, did ya know?” a voice rings out – and it’s Aaron, smirking, pulling a book out of the shelf without even bothering to look at what it is. “Just here,” he adds, pointing at his own shirt.

“Perceptive,” Robert drawls, only sparing him a glance before looking back over the Arithmetic section. He hates how he feels his neck go hot, pulling at his tie like it’s suddenly hard to breathe. “I see all that extra tutoring seems to have paid off.” 

“Ooh, harsh mate,” Aaron says, and he’s pushing in even closer now, leaning against the stack. “I’m hurt.”

Robert dares to look at him, just a little. His bottom lip is caught in his teeth, and his bright blue eyes dance over Robert’s face like he’s actually delighting in it; like he could do it all day given the chance. It makes Robert feel both beautiful and unworthy all at once.

“What do you want, Aaron?”

“You want me to write it down?”

“We’re in public,” Robert says, but it’s a stupid argument. That hasn’t stopped them in the past. “Someone could see us.”

Aaron gives him the most careless of shrugs. He’s always like that, always so disinterested, unaffected by what life throws at him - except maybe when it threw him Robert.

Robert just wants to get through school, get out of this town, go places. Other places. He’s not jeopardising that just to be Aaron Dingle’s _boyfriend_.

“I’m not the one wanting to keep it secret.”

“Is that such a bad thing?” Robert hisses, throwing a look over his shoulder. There’s really no one around, he can’t pretend otherwise. “D’ya really want Adam in ya face about this?”

“Adam won’t care. If it’s about the gay thing - ”

“I’m bisexual, and it’s not. Everyone already knows that about me.”

“Everyone knows I’m gay. Or at least most of ‘em do.” Aaron tips his head up and puts on a face, as if he’s deep in thought. Robert knows he’s mostly only deep in thought about Manchester United, or food, or how to innocently talk his way out of something. ”I mean, I could make an announcement at the next assembly, it’s no - ”

Aaron laughs when Robert hits him in the stomach with a textbook. “Shut up,” he says, but he can’t help the smile, or the laughter in his voice. “It’s not - just - whatever. Would you leave me alone now?”

“Depends, don’t it?” Aaron tips his head in, lowering his voice, “You still comin’ over later?”

“Why,” Robert replies, and he doesn’t mean to turn his body inward, doesn’t mean to sound so gravelly, so lustful, but it happens. “So you can pretend to listen while I attempt to teach you about linear equations?”

“Are you saying I’m thick?”

“Mmhmm,” Robert says, and he’s not sure if it’s him, or if it’s Aaron, or if it matters - but they’re kissing. Honey slow and almost chaste, just a hint of tongue, just a hint of warmth. It could escalate so easily - it always has with them - but Robert hears a far off sound and pulls away. “Fine. Later.”

Aaron huffs, but doesn’t argue. He reaches out to poke a finger through the hole in Robert’s shirt. It’s cool, and gentle, and it makes him shudder. “Reckon I prob’ly did that.”

“You like to think.”

“Yeah,” he says, smirking still, starting to walk backward from the way he came. Robert’s not sure why he’s fighting this. He’s not sure how much longer he can keep it up. “I do.”


	2. meeting at a festival au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaron really loves this song.

Aaron _loves_ this song.

He hears Ross playing it at the garage sometimes, tinny and muted; but he’d rather eat dirt than suggest he likes anything Ross likes, so he’s never heard it this way before. Loud and pulsing and seeping into his pores; curling around his bones like tendrils of smoke.

  
He can _fee_ l it.

  
“I fuckin’ love this song,” he tells whoever he’s pushed against, grabbing at their arm. It’s meltingly warm here, the thrum of bodies lolling him back and forth – like dancing but without the shame (Adam will still laugh though, wherever he’s gone).

“You right?” the guy Aaron’s grabbed yells into his ear and Aaron realises he’s still got a hold of him. He’s tall and fair and has a mouth that could probably make Aaron do more than just dance to a song – a mouth that’s smirking at Aaron as if he knows exactly what he’s thinking.

  
“Sorry, mate, just,” Aaron tips his head toward the stage.

  
“You fuckin’ love this song, yeah, I heard ya.”

  
The guy’s still smiling down at him, and Aaron thinks he’s probably smiling back, and the crowds keeps swirling like waves, keep crashing them together, shoulders and thighs. Aaron’s been getting steadily bladdered for the last two hours, he thrums, so he’s bolstered enough to ask,

  
“And you, what’d’ya reckon?” while he swallows around a lump in his throat.

  
“I reckon I was just tryin’ to pull this bird I like,” the guy shouts, his mouth so close Aaron can feel it peppering at his skin. Aaron’s sweating through his t-shirt, he can feel it drip slow down his back – and the heat of this guy’s long, lean body isn’t helping. “Wouldn’t’ve come otherwise.”

  
Aaron scoffs at his honesty. “Yeah,” he says, because he can’t argue. He’d only come away with Adam to appease him; to appease his mum and her nagging about moving on with his life. Whether she meant booze, and music, and (christ, he really hopes there’ll be) sex was another thing.

  
“Aaron,” he shouts to the guy, as he tips his face to the sky, to cool.

  
“Rob,” the guy shouts back. He’s damp at his temples, and there’s a glistening sheen across his throat, and Aaron bites his lip to refrain from biting anything else.

  
Bloody hell.

  
The next song is better than the last, and Aaron hoots a little, revelling in Rob’s laughter as they start to move with a little more purpose. The song beats up through Aaron’s feet, like a vice at his lungs, and he just goes with it, rolls with it, closing his eyes and feeling the bass.

  
How they go from shoulder to shoulder to belly to belly is anyone’s guess. It’s more like a twist and shove of their bodies, maybe even a grind, and Aaron’s smile turns into a smirk turns into a gasp. He loses track of the music, of time, lets his hands wander over the expanse of Rob’s chest, his shoulders.

  
He pushes closer when Rob’s hands travel lower on his back, pushes and pulls and reels him in close.

  
“How’d’it go with the bird you like?” he asks, their cheeks grazing, and though he can barely keep his feet flat on the ground anyway, the shine of Rob’s gaze makes him feel weightless. He’s going for this, he wants this, and he hasn’t wanted something for himself in a really long time.

  
“Never found her.”

  
Aaron licks at his bottom lips. “Shame.”

  
When Rob presses in it’s so hard their teeth crash, laughing through it as he open his mouth to right them. Aaron kisses back a little sloppily, a little too eager, and Rob’s big, strong hands at his face bring everything into focus. They’re just a speck against this landscape, a blurry hue of pinks and browns and blues and golds and if he could just sink into it he’d be so happy.

  
The music, the warmth, the feel of Rob’s hipbones pinching against him. The feel of his mouth, chapped and sweet, like cider.

  
“Don’t usually do this,” he feels the need to shout, because he means it, because he means this, no matter what it turns out to be. Rob just says,

  
“Lucky me, then,” he just grins and laughs and comes in for another kiss, and sod it. Maybe he will tell Ross.

  
Aaron fucking loves that song.


	3. meeting in the A&E au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, if he’d heard of some bloke coming off a toddler’s three wheeler and going head first into a tree Robert would be pretty amused too.

Everything’s a little hazy at the edges. His shoulder’s still pulsing, and he can hear someone singing (wailing) _The Human League_ , and he really, really wants to scratch his nose – but he can’t. Or at least, he’s not brave enough to try. Even if he’s up to his eyeballs in good drugs.

“Alright, Mr. Sugden?” a nurse says when he comes through to check on Robert. Another downside to having a broken collarbone and some unknown number of bruised ribs is not having the energy to rant. Does he _look_ okay?

“No.”

“How’s the pain? On a scale of one to ten, with one being - ”

“Fifteen.”

“Right,” the nurse says lowly, his mouth in a twisting smirk that’s a little too sarcastic for Robert’s liking. Honestly, if he’d heard of some bloke coming off a toddler’s three wheeler and going head first into a tree Robert would be pretty amused too. But he’s in pain, everything from the waist down is numb, and if one more nurse tells him the doctor will see to him as soon as possible he might jam one of these tubes up their nose. Andy can look after his own damn kids from now on.

“Oh, babe, I found you.” A twenty-something man with a thick beard and clomping boots comes stumbling through the curtains, looking lost. It takes him a moment to school his expression into anything other than shock, but when he does he looks at Robert with fondness - with something like _love_. Robert has to blink a few times to make sure he’s not hallucinating.

“What?”

“Are you okay?” he goes on, ignoring Robert’s confusion and reaching for his hand. Robert pulls it away, hurting when he pulls a disbelieving face. “Only, Maeve rang and said there’d been some kind of accident and I hung up on her before she was done explainin’ and shit, are you alright, look at ya beautiful face.”

Robert turns to the nurse for some help, still trying to scramble out of the strangers grasp. “I’ve never met this man before in my life,” he implores, and the man actually gasps and puts a hand up to his chest. Robert’s seen better acting on _Geordie Shore_.

“Oh, bloody hell,” he says, slumping into the chair by Robert’s bed and wiping at his face with big, rough hands. He turns a beseeching look onto the nurse. “Did he hit his head? Has he forgotten me?”

“I – I’m - ” The nurse flounders for Robert’s chart, rifling through the papers but apparently finding nothing. How a comical incident has now possibly turned into _While You Were Sleeping_ is apparently above this man’s pay grade. The chart clatters as he wrestles it back onto its hook.

“Let me just get the doctor, I’ll be right back.”

“What the hell are you playin’ at?” Robert snaps, watching the strange man’s horrified expression turn into one of smugness and amusement. He throws a look over his shoulder, and has a quick glance at his watch, but otherwise doesn’t move.

“Relax, _sweetheart_ ,” he says, unbothered, slumping back into his chair and crossing a foot over his knee. He’s attractive – Robert’s still lucid enough to see that – with that careless style Robert hates being drawn to. When he tips his head up to look at Robert, a vein pops in his neck. The world is so cruel today. “What happened to you, anyway?”

“I was attacked,” Robert says with a cough. “Big blokes. Didn’t see ‘em coming.”

“Yeah, I bet.”

“That’s brilliant, that is.” Robert tries to sit up a little on the bed, scooting enough that he’s not bent at the neck. He tries to go on, “Come in here like y’know me, then insult, that’s… ugh. That’s,” but soon it’s too much, and he’s puffed, and he can’t be bothered arguing.

“Don’t hurt y’rself,” the guy says, but he actually has a flicker of concern across his face, sitting up. Robert just huffs out a laugh.

“That’s great advice. Where were you a few hours ago?”

“If I tell ya,” he says, “Ya might be arrested for aiding and abetting, mate.”

A few things happen at once. Robert tries to choke out a “What?” and another voice starts to say, “Robert, are you - ” and the man leaps out of his chair to press his mouth to Robert’s. Gentle, like he remembers it might hurt, chaste, and soft, and Robert actually makes a stupid noise in the back of his throat.

“ _Aaron_?”

The guy spins around to see Andy standing there with two sandwiches, mouth open and face sour like someone’s just hit him with a wet fish. The stranger – Aaron - almost falls over trying to move away, his cheeks flushed and his voice full of laughter when he says,

“Uh, shite. Andy. Hey.” When he turns back to Robert, he winks (who bloody _winks_ , who is this guy,) and promises, “I’ll see ya,” not giving Andy a chance to say more before fleeing out of the cubicle.

Robert was hit by a tree trunk today and he still didn’t feel this stunned.

“ _Aaron Dingle_?” Andy shouts, breaking Robert’s reverie, and Robert swears at the ceiling.

“He’s a _Dingle_?”


	4. parents meeting when they drop their kids off at school au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaron looks terrible and Robert feels terrible and their kids are just embarrassed to be seen with them.

Harry’s just a mess of limbs and hair, tumbling out of the car. His school bag’s more than half the size of him, packed full of things Aaron’s pretty sure he doesn’t need. Books, stationery, stickers, toys – those little coloured sticky notes shaped like rockets and cars.

Aaron knows the enthusiasm won’t last. He doesn’t want to argue.

“No, no, _dad_ ,” he whines when he sees that Aaron is getting out of the car as well. “I know the way; you don’t have to take me.”

“Mate.” Aaron locks the car with a quick jab of the keys over his shoulder, pulling at his vest. He didn’t gel his hair, Harry spilt cereal on him this morning and his five o’clock shadow is looking more like _Grizzly_ _Adams_ _eat your heart out!_ Honestly, he wouldn’t want to be seen with him either. “It’s ya first day.”

“But not me first _year_ , _come on_.”

“Too bad,” Aaron teases, getting him around the neck to rub knuckles into his unruly curls. Harry splutters indignantly the whole way to his classroom, children calling out to him and families giving Aaron sympathetic looks.

Aaron’s going to have a teenager one day. He’s not ready for his eight year old to be too cool for him

“See ya, son!” Aaron’s calling as he backs out of Harry’s classroom. He’d been beet red and grumbling at Aaron about never doing his chores again. “Have a great day, mate! Be good for your teachers!”

He’s on the brink of throwing a particularly teasing _I love you!_ when he almost runs into a man hovering by the classroom window. The guy looks worried, stepping away then stepping back; gnawing on the pad of his thumb. Aaron’s never seen such a hopeless case in all his life.

“Alright?”   

He startles. “Uh, yeah, sorry mate, just – just my daughter.”

“Right. Your first drop off?”

“New school.”

Aaron sucks in a breath. “That’s rough. Were there tears and all?”

“From who, from her?” he asks, eyes wide, as if Aaron just asked him whether the Queen was visiting. “No, no, _she’s_ fine.”

“Oh.” When the man (he’s older than Aaron, he thinks, though most of the parents are) turns to look at him properly, Aaron’s a little in awe. He’s wearing a suit, for starters, all crisp and expensive looking – and there’s not a hair out of place. He looks like he just stepped off a photo shoot. “So it’s you then.”

“Guilty,” he tells Aaron sheepishly, scratching at the back of his head with a grin. “I tried to pay her to have a sick day but she basically camped out by the front door last night she was so keen.”

“Sounds like my son. Harry. I could tell him to keep an eye out for her.”

“No, no,” he shakes his head, looking desperately at the window again as if maybe she heard them. “She’ll have me murdered if ya do that. She’ll be – it’s fine.”

When he seems to be content with whatever he’s seeing in the classroom, he looks over Aaron properly. The quick flicker of his gaze is enough to heat Aaron’s face, and when the man offers his hand to shake Aaron nearly trips over his own feet.

Pathetic.

“Robert Sugden.”

“Aaron Dingle,” Aaron returns so quickly, that he almost doesn’t catch what the other man has said. “Er, Sugden. Not – not like Victoria Sugden?”

“Yeah. How did you -  

“Adam’s me best mate.”

“Wow. Small world.”

“Small town.” Aaron amends, and for the first time in a very long time he realises he’s not bitter about that. He clears his throat to try and win back a little dignity, but it obviously doesn’t work because the next thing that comes out of his mouth is, “So, her mum, she’s not here today?”

He pulls a face at his own stupidity.

“Oh, no. No, she’s – not in the picture.”

“Right. Same – well, not the same, I mean. Harry’s mum’s in the picture.” If only Harry’s mum _was_ here right now. She’d be laughing her arse off. “But he lives with me and spends holidays with her and all that.”

“Right.”

“So, uh.” Aaron tips his head toward the car park, motioning for Robert to walk with him. He seems to falter for just a moment, but he steels himself with his hands in his pockets and moves on. It makes Aaron smile. “What brings you here? Vic?”

“Mostly. She’s been trying to get me here since Zoe was a baby but it was never the right time, with work and everything.”

“You’re planning to stay, then?”

Robert throws him a sideways glance, twisting his mouth into something simultaneously mocking and sexy. “For now, definitely.”

“That’s good. I mean. You’ll have family, and Zoe’ll have some routine and all that, you know.” Aaron can hear himself prattling like an idiot but Robert’s just smiling at him, bright and easy. “Which is hard to get when it’s just the two of ya, I mean, I know that. It’s good when things are simple, y’know, when it’s, it’s simple.”

“That’s the idea.” Robert looks at his watch. Aaron’s just glad he’s not being laughed at.“Anyway, I don’t want to hold you up. Looks like you have somewhere to be.”

“Yeah, uh, Adam and me have a scrapping business,” Aaron tells him, thumbing at an eyebrow. “Across town.”

“ _Right_.” Robert clicks his fingers. He has big hands, Aaron’s noticed, and strong wrists, from what he can see, and broad shoulders, pulled back, like he’s – _he’s outside his son’s school what is he doing?_ “Aaron. Vic talks about you. I didn’t make the connection.”

“I s’pose she just calls me the dumb clod who likes to nick her breakfast in the morning?”

“No, no,” Robert says with a careless wave of a hand. “Just surprised she didn’t have ‘Adam’s fit best friend’ on her pros and cons list.”

Aaron’s not sure what to do but splutter at that. He had a whole speech working through his head, a whole ‘since we’re both single dads and you’re new to town, maybe I could take your number and we could have dates that are thinly veiled as friendly meetings’ thing. But direct worked, he supposed. Direct was actually refreshing. “What, on the Pro list’n’all?”

“For sure,” Robert says with a nod, reaching into his coat pocket. “Definite drawing card, you are.”

“Ta, mate,” Aaron says with a little shake of his head, but he’s smiling, and he’s not trying to hide it. “That’s good to know.”

“Here.” Robert hands Aaron a business card. Estate Agent, it says, which turns his brow. With that face, those lips, the hint of sharpness to his tongue – he probably could turn doting dad into charming salesman pretty quick. Aaron wonders what else he’ll be learning about this man.

“Right.”

“No doubt we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, but, still. Some assurance.”

Aaron’s got a, _you don’t need that mate_ , on the tip of his tongue, but he doesn’t want to come across desperate. His kid would be the first to tell him that.

“Zoe’ll be great. I promise ya,” is all he thinks to say, and he’s glad to see Robert soften at the words. Maybe it isn’t a lot coming from someone he just met. But it’s sincere. It’s heartfelt. Aaron’s been right where Robert’s standing.

Robert knows it.

“Thanks."


	5. two miserable people meeting at a wedding au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What's a wedding without Wham!, booze and hooking up with the best man?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings for explicit content and drunk!sex.

It’s getting late, and Robert is still too sober for this. For eighties ballads, and cooing couples and chubby toddlers with sticky fingers messing up his suit pants. When he’d agreed to come to his sister’s wedding it was before she’d informed him it would be _here_ , in this town, with _these_ people; standing up next to Andy and putting on a smiling face. What a joke.

“ _Leave_ , then,” Vic’d told him in no uncertain terms the day before. He had a black eye, and Andy had a bruised fist, and alright, he incited it, but he didn’t even take a swing! It’s not his fault Andy’s afraid of the truth.

But it’s Vic. With those doe eyes and that stubborn streak and he loves her – more than he’s probably loved any one, if he’s honest.

He’s going to sit through this thing if it kills him.

“Unbelievable,” a huffing voice says from across the table. Robert’s barely been sat there for a moment, so he doesn’t realise it’s directed at him, until he looks over and sees Adam’s best man – Alan, maybe? Aaron? – throwing him filthy looks.

“Take a picture,” Robert grumbles, sinking lower into his seat. His tie’s long gone and his sleeves are rolled up and he knew he should have ordered those shots at the bar. He can’t be bothered getting back up now.

“I might, mate,” the guy bites back, taking a gulp of his beer. “Then put some funny words on it and stick it on the internet.”

“You might wanna work on your threats while you’re at it.”

“If I was threatening ya, you’d know about it.”

Robert shuffles around in his chair enough to get a better look at the guy. Truthfully he hadn’t gotten a good look at any one all day. He’d been too busy staring at his feet or counting marks on the wall or doing anything to distract himself from the fact his sister was marrying a total pillock.

Alan – no it’s Aaron, it’s definitely Aaron – is fit, if you go for that sort of thing. Scruffy, and built, and that _just try me_ stare that Robert had seen on so many guys and taken as a personal challenge. Honestly, after he’d broken up with Chrissie and spent a few months in the scummiest flat he’d ever laid eyes on – Aaron was just the sort of guy he would have taken home.

“Right, you’re a Dingle.”

Aaron actually seems surprised. “What’s that go to do with anything?”

“You’re from Cain’s lot, yeah? Fight first, talk later.”

“Says the muppet with the black eye.”

“I got hit, I didn’t do the hitting.”

“You deserved to get hit.”

Robert just huffs. They’re a few tables back from the dance floor, white lace hanging low and soft golden lights twisting around. Vic’d done a good job with it, all things considered; looking around you wouldn’t think they were a few blocks away from a pig sty.

“Why’d you have to do that, anyway? She was in a right state she was.”

“What business is it of yours?”

“She’s my mate. I care about her.”

“Well, newsflash, Aaron – Vic’s fine. Look at her.” _Wham!_ was playing so loud it was making Robert’s ears bleed, and Vic was dancing in a the middle of a big crowd of friends. Everyone was trying to get Adam to join her. “She’s sickeningly happy, get me a bucket.”

Robert almost doesn’t believe it when he hears Aaron give a snort of laughter. He sits up in his chair enough to slam his hand on the table, accusing, “Mr. Poor Old Vic over here.”

Aaron tries to twist his mouth into something less amused but he’s failing pretty spectacularly. It makes Robert smile too. “I said nought,”

“You’re just as revolted by their so called fairytale as I am,” he says, and that’s enough to get Aaron’s face to fall. Robert almost feels bad about it.

“It’s nice that they’re happy,” he says, and he’s _sincere_ , and Robert thinks that just makes him angrier. It’s so small town, so _Emmerdale_ ; he’d resented it ever since he was a teen.

“But you’re not,” he feels the need to point out, because it’s written all over Aaron’s face. The dark eyes, and the chapped lips and the way it twisted into discontent – Robert wants to poke at it. He wants someone to just be angry like he is.

“Again, what’s that got to do with it?”

“Come on,” Robert says decisively, standing up. His jacket and tie are thrown over the chair but he’s not going to need them. It’s unseasonably warm, even more so inside, and he’s hoping to get enough pints in that he won’t feel much of anything.

“Where are we going?”

“To get more beer. Lots of beers.”

Aaron’s no soft touch. He matches Robert drink for drink until he’s unwound enough that he can prattle on about some ex-boyfriend, and France, and trying to make a name for himself in a town that thinks they already know it. Robert can relate.

“What’s on after this?” he asks, tipping their heads closer. The bloke behind the bar’s been throwing them looks, like he’s considering throwing them out, but Robert can deal.

“After the wedding?” Aaron says with a confused look. “Nothing.”

Robert scoffs. “Of course.”

It takes Aaron a few moments – a few drawn out bars of Bruno Mars’ _Marry You_ because apparently his sister got her playlist off So You’re Getting Married Dot Com – for Aaron to suck his bottom lip into his mouth nervously. To say, timid – which was another surprise- “You – you want to do something?”

It sounded more like _you want to head out_ , and it went straight to Robert’s dick, and if Aaron thought he was going to wait another hour for this wedding to be over he had another thing coming. “You offering?”

“Maybe.”

“Alright.” Robert gulps down the rest of his pint and shimmies off his stool. He curls a hand around Aaron’s bicep, revelling in the stretch of it, firm beneath his hands. “Meet you out the front in five.”

He’s not sure how they get away with it – or if they do – with Aaron stumbling out of the hall like the building’s on fire. He mumbles something about his place being empty, already getting his keys out, and for the first time since he got back Robert’s glad he’s in Emmerdale and only has to walk a short distance.

“Fuck,” Aaron groans the minute the door slams behind them, Robert pulling at his waistband, taking control.

“Yeah, yeah.”

It’s amateur, and fumbling, trying to get up the stairs. They knock mouths, and crash into walls, and end up a laughing mess on Aaron’s tiny bed with Robert’s shirt stuck half of his head. For all his slumping and his moping Aaron’s hiding a beautiful body; thick and taut and muscular and so good to get his mouth on.

“Shit, you’re _\- God, so good_ ,” Aaron tells Robert, later, laid out naked on his bed and panting. His arse is up and Robert’s fingers are inside him and a sheen of sweat shines across his brow. Robert scoffs.

“Look who’s talking.”

Robert’s drunk, but he feels it all. He feels the dragging thrust as he pushes inside him, feels the bruising dig of Aaron’s heels in his back. He feels Aaron’s breath on his skin, and his blunt nails in his shoulders, and all the rest of it, the crackle and the fizz and the burn.

It turns quick and rough when Aaron urges him on, grunting, “Do it, do it,” pushing to meet Robert’s thrusts. He hasn’t had it like this in a while – Jesus, maybe he’s never had it like this – and he can’t control himself any more than he could when Aaron said, _you want to do something_ , can’t stop himself, doesn’t want it to stop.

“I’m, I’m,” Aaron warns him, a hand around his own leaking cock and his head tipped back as he comes. His throat’s right there, like some kind of offering, and Robert bites down as he comes too; whining and gasping and filthy.

“Bloody hell,” Robert says in a breath, pulling out with a wet pop and almost rolling off the bed. He throws the condom wherever, still catching his breath, still trying to work out what’s happened to him. He feels like he’s been hit by a truck.

“You leavin’ tomorrow?” Aaron asks into the darkness, rolling onto his side and tucking in close, giving them more room to move.

“Maybe,” Robert says, and the thought doesn’t sit bad, it just sits loose. Pliant. Like it could be convinced otherwise. Given the right motivation. “Maybe not.”


	6. roommates au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaron's always been stupid in love.

There’s a label on every single thing in Aaron’s fridge. Named, dated, and initialled. There’s a certain way he has to put his cups, and a specific way to stack the dish rack, and if he finishes the last of something he has to put it on the shopping list that’s stuck to the cupboard door.

Which is enough to live with.

Only, his roommate – Robert – also likes to listen to Taylor Swift in the shower. He likes tuna, and herbal tea, and watching Antiques Roadshow like he’s some Oxford scholar who has any idea what they’re talking about. He likes to shag someone new every other week (Aaron reckons it’d be every other day if he only had the time), loudly, then lie in the next morning while Aaron has to endure awkward conversations with embarrassed strangers about just where they are and just how the hell they get back to town.

It’s wearing thin.

Only, besides this – or God help him, because of this – Aaron thinks he might (possibly, most probably) be in love with him. Which is stupid, and Aaron’s always been stupid in love.

“Mate, you gotta get outta there,” Adam – best friend and worst relationship expert – tells him for the hundredth time over a beer at the pub.

“And go where?”

“I don’t know man, just, come stay with us for a bit, until you find somewhere.

“Vic’s the one trying to push this!” Aaron protests, and it’s not a lie. He thinks she probably went straight to Robert and told him how Aaron felt because one afternoon Robert had hinted heavily at Aaron joining him and whatever guy he had coming around.

Which was tempting – Robert had been wearing a shirt, and a blazer, and his hair all styled like he was modelling designer ware, shit had it been tempting – but not enough. Aaron respects Robert’s choice not to settle down. But he’s never been casual about any one in his whole life.

“No, Az, not when she knows what it’s doing to ya, just - ” Adam claps him on the shoulder, giving it a little shake – “Just, think about it, yeah?”

Aaron’s thought about moving out a lot. When Robert’s sung a song so off key he’s ended up in fits of laughter, making Aaron smile. When he’s sprayed his cologne and walked through the house and left traces of it lingering all day. When he’s fallen asleep on the couch with his feet in Aaron’s lap and his head tipped back to expose the long line of his throat. The long line of his everything.

Aaron hates to pine. He really hasn’t much.

“You think if ya have a system for every bloody thing in this place you might also have a system for sex?” Aaron yells at Robert later that same week, after waving off some 6 foot something bloke with smooth, dark skin and muscles for days and an arrogance that set Aaron’s teeth on edge.

Robert’s in nothing but a threadbare shirt and pyjama shorts, his hair still all mussed from sleep. He gives Aaron a cocky grin as he heads for the fridge. “Oh, I have a system.”

“I meant like, a sock on the door or, Jesus, I don’t know, a note,” Aaron motions to the list on the cupboard. “Get eggs, buy the paper, Thursday is shagging day.” 

Robert huffs out a laugh. “I don’t have a little book that I pull names out of, Aaron. If it happens, it happens, and sometimes there’s no warning.”

“Oh, we’ve got Casanova here, nice,” Aaron says bitterly, rolling his eyes. He’s suddenly thrumming with this feeling, this unsettledness, like he wants to punch something but he also wants to cower. It’s weak. “Don’t mind me I just live here, ‘n’all.”

“What is this, Junior School?” Robert says teasingly. He pulls out the juice, and a glass, setting everything down as his normal routine. Aaron could narrate it in his sleep. “Adults have sex, Aaron. Or have you forgotten?” 

“What’s _that_ supposed to mean?”

“It means just because you can’t get any doesn’t mean you have to get all pissy because I can.”

Aaron stands up so fast from his chair it tumbles backwards. “That’s not the point, Robert!” he yells, watching as Robert’s jaw squares, his glass frozen where he was about to lift it to his mouth.

“Then what is?” he says, even but angry. “You’re not my mother, I’m not a child, I don’t have to ask you if I can have a _friend_ over - ”

“I don’t _want_ to do that!”

“You just said - ”

“I don’t want to see one more sodding person walk out of that room looking well fucked because _I_ want to be that person,” Aaron shouts, pointing at the door as if the thing itself has personally offended him. He’s out of breath and he’s not sure why – though the suddenly stunned look on Robert’s face might have something to do with it. “I want to be the _only_ person. And I know your right, I know that’s pathetic, but I can’t - ”

“Aaron - ”

“It’s not ya fault – it doesn’t matter. I just gotta – I can’t stay here any more.”

“Aaron.”

Aaron just puts a hand up to quiet him, and heads towards his bedroom. He feels a little sick, and hot at his neck, and he’s not sure what he’s trying to accomplish by pulling clothes out of drawers and throwing them on his bed. He’s got work in a half hour; he hasn’t got time for this.

“I don’t know what you thought,” Robert says softly from the doorway. He doesn’t breech it, just standing there with his arms crossed. “But I didn’t know that, y’know. I had no idea you felt … _feel_ like that.”

“Come on, Robert,” Aaron huffs, slumping onto his bed. There’s a pair of socks on the floor that are Robert’s, and a book by the bed that’s Robert’s and a football poster on the wall that Robert bought him. He’s drowning in it.

“I’m _serious_ ,” he says, and he’s walking into the room, and when Aaron looks up at him, sees the way Robert looks at him, he realises he’s telling the truth. 

“Vic didn’t tell you?”

“No.”

“Then why did you – that night when some bloke was comin’ over, and you told me I should join ya, I - ”

“Vic’s known that long?”

“Longer.”

“I’ll kill her,” Robert hisses, and it almost makes Aaron laugh. He’s every villian in a slapstick comedy brought to life. 

“It _doesn’t matter_ ,” he insists, because as much as Robert’s an arsehole, as much as he delights in being a smug, pretentious prick, he’s also a pretty decent bloke when he wants to be. You always know where you stand with him.

“Yeah Aaron, it does,” Robert says, coming to stand a little nearer. “Because she knows that I want you too.”

“ _What_?” Aaron snaps, and is somehow, suddenly on his feet. Robert straightens, and has the audacity to look hard done by, which for some reason just sets Aaron off more.

“I wanted ya from day one - ” 

“Why would you shag everything that moves when I was just down the hall you muppet!”

“I didn’t know!” Robert insists, his arms out. “You’d just finished with Ed, and you were angry all the time, and I thought – y’know – if we were mates it’d be better, for both of us, havin’ to live here and - ”

“Unbelievable,”

“I _want you_ , Aaron, I wasn’t playing games. I want you more than I ever wanted any one and if you’d just said, if you’d just asked, I would have, I would - "

Aaron pushes into Robert so hard he flails back into the wall behind him. They land with a thump, with Aaron’s hands fisted in his shirt and his heart in his throat. There’s a thrilling pause, a tilt of their heads and a hitch of their breaths and the overwhelming sense of what’s to come.

Aaron knows.

The faces Robert makes when Aaron’s eating cereal, the way he looks at the clock when he knows Aaron’s running late, the way he makes these cut off sounds when he’s fucking, so loud, so teasing – Aaron knows it. And now he gets to have it for himself.

“Kiss me,” he demands, at last, and Robert takes his face in his hands and does.


	7. living in a society where their love is taboo au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaron knows that his community - his family - would punish him just like Robert’s had, were they to find out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sci-fi/fantasy. warnings for a brief and non graphic retelling of public humiliation and restraint.

Aaron waits until the bonfire’s five feet high, until the others are happily buzzing with food and wine and the music from Sam’s guitar. He’d saved his share of the givings, filling up a canvas bag to take with him; and now his arms and elbows graze along the rough of the walls as he runs, keeping it aloft.

It’s quiet, out of Town Central. Aaron ducks and dodges so as not to leave any familiar traces; leaping over small standing fence lines and stooping to miss some abandoned tunnels. He likes altitude, too, up old brass ladders and across creaky beams he’s set up between buildings – but he can’t risk it tonight, with the food, and the bright light of the moon. He stays crouched, and hidden. 

It’s only after he’s crawled out of a small hole in the south-facing wall that he can finally breathe. There’s nothing left to see from there, just the tall, formidable shape of his world bearing down on him, so he turns and heads out past The Edge. 

Robert’s already there.

He’s huddled beneath some trees and fiddling with the grass, and it’s still strange to see his hair shorn so close to his head. It’s still sickening to remember _why_ , to remember the day the _Tempus_ held Aaron down and made him watch. Watch Robert strip to almost nothing, watch Robert forced to his knees, watch Robert wince as his beautiful, golden hair was pulled at, hacked at, thrown away. 

It was a message to Aaron, _‘you’ve done this’_ \- so he had watched. He’d owed Robert that.

“You made it,” Robert says, standing up, and the sight of his smile makes Aaron’s heart crackle like they fire he’d just left behind.

“Yes, have I never?”

“No, of course not, I just - ” 

The bag drops between their feet as Aaron pulls Robert in to kiss him. He’s wearing his thin, wearing greys and his skin is cool against Aaron’s mouth, and his instinct is just to pull him in. Just wrap his arms around Robert and hold fiercely on. So he does. 

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Robert mutters at the space beneath Aaron ear, low on his neck. _That’s_ warm, warm like his tongue and his lips and the place where their hips meet. Warm in a way they only find in their lovemaking – warm in a way he thinks about at night when he’s alone, and lonely.

“I brought food,” Aaron says, reluctantly pulling apart enough that he can reach for the bag. There’s some bread, and fruit, and what he could get of the meat – there’s a small flask of wine that Aaron hopes he can return to Cain’s trunk before he sees it gone.

“You didn’t have to.” 

“I wanted to. I want to share it with you.”

They sit at the foot of a tree, pressed together. Aaron watches as Robert sorts through it all, the mark of the _Tempus_ long and elegant at his inner arm. The gentle, swirling curves are so different from the sharp, triangular lines of Aaron’s own; but he’s traced it with his eyes, his fingers, his mouth, he knows it as if it _were_ his.

“Let me feed you,” Robert says with a small smile, breaking a small piece of bread and bringing it to Aaron’s mouth. Aaron opens for it, watching Robert watch him, his expression dark with lust. “This is what we do, at home, to show each other respect, and trust and, and love.“ 

“That’s nice,” Aaron says around a cough, feeling it in his throat, and at his legs, and he shudders.

“That’s _nice_?” Robert says with a huff of a laugh, nudging Aaron with an elbow. “Are you so hard to flatter?”

“Oh, shut up,” Aaron bites back, and he flings an arm around his neck to pull him close, taking another bite of bread from Robert’s hand. They eat and they kiss and then eat some more, and Aaron hums as he rests his head on Robert’s shoulder. Hums as he runs his hand over Robert’s head, feels the prickles of hair across his scalp.

“It’s still so short.”

“They’ll keep cutting it,” Robert says softly, taking a mouthful of wine. “Until I’ve proved myself worthy to have it back.” 

“How must you _prove yourself worthy_?” Aaron asks bitterly, turning enough that he can look at Robert’s eyes. They cast down.

“I - “ 

“ _Robert_.”

“Don’t worry Aaron, please,” he says with a shake of his head. The food and drink tumbles onto the ground as Robert gets up to his knees, gently shifting and shoving to get Aaron down onto his back on the cool ground. “They just – they care about me and want what’s best for me, so - ”

“You think they’re right?” Aaron says, seething, grabbing at the threadbare cotton of Robert’s clothes, anything he can reach. “That we shouldn’t be together any more - ”

“No. _Never_. I love you more than anything.” 

“I love you, too.” 

Robert’s smile unfurls slowly, and he says, “I’m _flattered_ ,” with every inch of teasing. They laugh together, wrestling, until all that’s left is the hard press of their mouths and the strong curl of their legs and the heat, so much heat, coursing through his body like his blood is alight.

“We could start our own society,” Aaron says softly, knowing that the _Novus_ , his family, would never accept this either. Would probably punish Aaron just as much, were they to find out. He doesn’t hate the _Tempus_ , because Robert doesn’t – because they’re part of Robert and Aaron vows never to hate any part of him. 

“Let’s,” Robert says with a soft smile, slumping his body on top of Aaron. “You can build the houses, and I’ll see to the harvest, and we’ll never want for anything, ever again.” 

Aaron has a lot. Aaron has the thick, hooded layers of his clothes and all the silver in his ears and all the leather at his wrists and all the things his dusty coins can buy. Aaron’s just covered, covered, covered in _things_ but still has nothing at the same time. When he’s not with Robert all he does is want.

“Perhaps we don’t need a new world, perhaps we just need to change this one,” Robert says, when Aaron doesn’t answer him. “We can learn about your sciences and you can learn about our religion and we can meet here somewhere, in the middle.”

“Yes,” Aaron says, though they both know it’s just a dream, just a folly to cling to at night when they can’t cling to each other. He’ll take it. “Tell me more.”

“We will be wed, of course, and our families will rejoice,” Robert starts, and now it’s Aaron curled into him, Aaron with his hands full of cotton and skin and closing his eyes and imagining it. He presses his mouth to Robert’s throat, his pulse, presses hard like an _I do_. “And we’ll have a large home, and we’ll take in the lost children, and we’ll send them to school, teach them of our history, and our future, teach them what happened to us when we learnt hate instead, when we learnt that we can’t have each other. They will …”

His voice drifts up, and up, into the stars. 

Into the nothingness of the night.


	8. teacher/single parent au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robert's daughter knows he becomes a stammering mess every time he's in her teacher's company.

Abby’s hair is so long that it sits at the small of her back. She used to let Robert braid it, when she was younger, used to praise him for his wonky designs and pretty ribbons and prance around the house like nobility. Apparently the task has become too great for him, these days, because she refuses to let him anywhere near it.

She’s almost thirteen. There’s not much in her life he is allowed near, if he’s honest.

“Aunt Deb said I could go there, before the school dance,” Abby says as they’re idly pushing their trolley around the supermarket. She tries to hoist herself up so he’ll push her along but he shakes it, and she falls, giggling.

“Oh, yeah? Nice you asked me first.”

“Dad, _come on_ ,” she groans, and the way her freckly nose wrinkles reminds him so much of her mother. It makes Robert smile. “Like you wanna listen to me talk about _shoes_.”

“You said I had good fashion sense!”

“On _you_. But _you’re_ a forty year old bloke - ” 

“ _38_ ,” he hisses, because she knows full well.

“ – and _I’m_ a teenage girl. You do the maths.” 

“The maths is goin’ home without _Cookie Crisp,_ you keep up that attitude.”

“You’re such a - ” she starts to say, but they almost run into someone turning into an aisle. Abby leaps back with a smile. “Oh, hey, Mr. Dingle!”

“Alright, Abby?” The man says, and Robert quickly recognises it as her Metal Work teacher. The school had brought him in the year before after pressure from families to focus more on technologies; the whole class had been fashioned to Mr Dingle’s – _Aaron’s_ \- experience in mechanics and scrap work. It’s impressive. He’s impressive. “Mr. Sugden.”

“It’s Robert,” he hears himself say, stupidly, and they both choose to ignore the laugh Abby muffles into her arm. She knows him well – she knows the stammering mess he’s become every time he’s in the other man’s company. At the parent teacher meetings, at the school fundraisers, at that farce of a sport’s day where they threw Robert in as football coach at the last minute when he had no idea about football (he’d been lucky Aaron was there).

It was becoming a problem.

“Right, well, don’t let me stop ya from …” Aaron motions to the trolley which, at this point, is only stocked with bread and gummy bears.

“Scurvy,” Robert says and is delighted by the sound of Aaron’s small, rough laugh. Abby can tease him all she wants but this man is _well fit_. Beautiful, if he’s being honest, with his strong stature and full mouth and a self-effacing air that attracts Robert even more.

He’s not so easily drawn.

“I wasn’t thinkin’that.” 

“Sure.”

“Really. I only buy the healthy stuff in case I run into students and set a bad example,” he says, throwing a look at Abby that makes her smile. It’s a small exchange but it does something stupid to Robert’s stomach, urging him forward.

“Your secret’s safe with us,” he tells Aaron, folding his arms with a grin. “Wouldn’t want the other teachers to know.”

“Sure, like they’re not eatin’ sponge and custard tarts every tea break.” 

“Hey, Mr. Dingle,” Abby cuts in, Aaron’s smiling gaze quickly turning to address her. She’s pretending to be nonchalant, pretending to browse the Pet Toys when they don’t even have a pet. “Are you gonna be at the dance next week?”

Aaron makes a groaning noise, throwing his head back a little. “Yeah. Mr. Barton and I flipped a coin.”

“Cool,” Abby says, and she almost gives her shoulder a little shrug. Seriously, Robert believes in her, wholeheartedly, and would be the first in line to hurt any one who stood in the way of following her dreams. But she’s a _terrible_ actress. He smells this ploy a mile away. “Dad was just groanin’ about havin’ to take me, so now the two of you can be miserable together.”

There it is.

“Oh,” Aaron says, and if the red flush on his cheeks is anything to go by, he didn’t miss that sledgehammer of a hint either. It takes every ounce of restraint Robert has not to throw his face into his hands and whimper. “Right. I don’t s’pose they’ll let us oldies pick some music?”

“You wouldn’t want that. Dad’s into _glam metal_.”

“Oh, no.” Aaron lets out something like a hoot, and all Robert can do is laugh. He tries to protest, cries,

“Who doesn’t like Def Leppard, come on!” but it falls on deaf ears, the two of them sniggering at his expense. He tries to leap over and poke at his daughter but she’s fast, and she’s unapologetic, forcing Aaron to take a step back as she goes wriggling past him.

“I’m gonna have to leave yas there, I reckon,” Aaron says as they calm down, starting to move backwards toward the next aisle. He’s giving Robert fleeting glances, he looks shy, and bloody hell if that doesn’t make it worse. Robert’s screwed. “But uh, I’ll see you.”

“Yeah,” Robert promises, as Abby’s calling out, _bye, Mr. Dingle!_ and spinning off further down the rows. “You will.”

When he’s finally finished watching Aaron walk off – the broad expanse of his shoulders, his arse in those jeans, shit – and finally catches up with Abby, she’s grinning at him like she’s proud of herself.

“ _Unbelievable_.”

“ _Me_?” she splutters, throwing the tea leaves they need into the trolley. “While you’re stood there flirtin’ with my teacher and all?”

“I wasn’t - ”

“Right, Dad, _uh huh_.” Abby puts a hand on her chest, flinging her head back. “Oh please, call me Robert, oh no, let’s not tell the teachers you like to eat crisps, oh wait, I must laugh at that banter, you’re hilarious.”

“Keep your voice down!” he stage whispers, grinning, the sound of her giggling clutching at his heart.

They’re a good team, the two of them.

He’s excited for someone else to be part of it.


	9. meeting at a masquerade ball au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aaron thinks this whole party is ridiculous. Except, maybe, for one thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just to let you know this is more aaron/omc and robron pre-slash.

There’s a _chandelier_. From the floor, and looking up, Aaron reckons the whole thing wouldn’t even fit into his flat. Between that, the fountain of free booze and the wall to wall buffet tables, he’s at a loss as to which is more ridiculous. The air _oozes_ money.

“Your arse looks amazing in those pants,” Liam mutters into his ear as he comes up behind Aaron. He passes him a glass of something white and bubbly and Aaron doesn’t bother to argue. 

This whole – _thing_ between them has mostly been Aaron just going along for the ride. Throw in a crowded masquerade ball with a twenty piece orchestra and he’s almost beyond the point of trying to understand it. _Rich people_.

“Cheers,” Aaron says, and gulps half of the glass down in one swing.

“For the drink or the compliment?” Liam asks with a smirk. Aaron shrugs.

“Both, I guess.”

Personally, Aaron thinks he looks like a total twat. He’s wearing a _mask_ , for starters, a fancy one; all black and green stitching that changes colour in certain lights. But Liam – with those eyes, that gaze, that _mouth_ – he’s managed to find a way to make Aaron do just about anything he wouldn’t normally do.

(The night at the strip club still makes Aaron blush when he thinks about it.)

“You’re such a tease,” Liam tells him as he steps further into Aaron’s space. Their heads duck close and Liam runs a thumb along his bottom lip and Aaron would like to argue about who’s teasing who.

“What’d I do?” 

“Just, that sour look you get. Like you’re daring someone to say something.”

“That’s not teasin’ mate,” Aaron says, pulling a different face altogether. 

“Yes, it is, you just don’t know it.” Liam reaches out enough to pull at Aaron’s shirt, a finger hooked in behind buttons. His eyes are hard to see behind the silver of his mask but the rest of his body isn’t hard to read. “We should go somewhere.”

“I thought you had to, y’know, wheel and deal or whatever,” Aaron says, but he’s not fighting Liam on it. He was ready to leave before he even got here.

“I don’t mean go.”

“Seriously?”

“There’s a little spot.” Liam motions with a nod of his head. “Dark, private, no one will -”

“I’m getting something to eat,” Aaron cuts in, and ignores Liam when he calls out; bumping into a few people as he hurriedly pushes toward the food. He’s not sure why the invitation bothers him so much. Or maybe it’s the _insinuation_. That Aaron plays games, that Aaron’s easily led, that Aaron’s something Liam thinks he is.

It’s stupid, he knows, _irrational_.

He’s never given Liam a reason to think otherwise. 

“The trick is to pick it up,” a voice rings out from his left, and when Aaron looks over, looks up, he sees a man with his arm out, offering Aaron a plate. Aaron’s too embarrassed to do anything other than take it.

“Right, thanks.” 

“You can take a photo, if you want,” he tells Aaron, nodding towards the buffet. He has a familiar accent, a rough edge to his voice that’s so different to what he’s been hearing all night. So different to Liam, and how his mouth fits so perfectly around words, like a dance. “I won’t judge.” 

“I think I’ll pass.”

“You sure? Don’t want to put it on _SnapGram_ or whatever?”

Aaron can’t help his little, huffing laugh. “No, Grandad.”

“Hey, I’m young in here,” the man says, tapping his chest. “You don’t know me.”

They busy themselves with the food for a few moments, Aaron unabashed about piling on as much as he can get. If he’s going to be subjected to this for a few more hours he doesn’t want to be hungry as well.

“Do you even know what’s in that?” the stranger asks with a curl of his lips, and it’s enough to make Aaron scowl.

“What’s that s’posed to mean?”

“Nothin, I just meant - ”

“What, like you can tell one sodding pastry from the next, Gordon Ramsay?”

“Wow,” the man says on a breath, and brings a hand up to scratch at his head. He’s long, Aaron’s noticed, with broad shoulders, and although half his face is covered Aaron senses an air of smug. Of _expensive_. “I’m making bad impressions without even trying now. Great.”

“No, I’ve just met plenty of blokes like you, mate,” Aaron says with a scoff, and a point of a finger. “Actually, I’m with one right now. He’s probably lookin’ for me.”

“Oh, right,” the guy says, and he’s grinning. He’s got a nice mouth, Aaron thinks idly. “Big guy, is he? Gonna push me around?” 

“You really think _I’d_ need someone to do that for me?”

Despite the red and slanting cut of his mask, Aaron can see the way the man’s eyes drag up over his body. He has to tamp down on the heavy feeling in his throat. “No, I guess not.” 

“Right, well,” Aaron mutters, then takes a bite out of something from his plate. The taste is so sudden and shocking that he can’t even stop himself from retching – flailing about for something, anything, to make it go away. 

Unfortunately it’s the handsome stranger with a napkin and a glass of water.

“See!” he’s saying while Aaron drains the glass, and he’s not even bothering to pretend he’s not laughing. Aaron hasn’t got it in him to be annoyed. “I’ve been to a few of these things now; I know what you have to watch out for.”

“I bet you do,” Aaron says with a hooded look, and it’s nice to see a flush creeping up the other man’s neck. He moves from foot to foot, and plays at the edge of his plate, before blurting out,

“Well, the subtle approach didn’t work - ”

“That was _subtle_?”

“You wanna dance?”

“No,” Aaron says, holding his breath, but when he sees the way the man’s shoulders slump he quickly adds, “I mean, I shouldn’t.”

“Right. The bodyguard.”

“That.” Aaron sighs. “Plus, y’know, I don’t even know your name.”

“It’s Robert,” he says and proffers his,hand. “I’m thirty-two, I work in real estate, I have a cat and, the truth is, I’ve been watching you all night.”

Aaron’s hand lingers where it had been clasped in Robert’s. He’s having trouble tearing his gaze away. He clears his throat. “That’s embarrassing.”

“Only the part where you spent, like, five whole minutes staring at the ceiling.”

“Did you see that thing?”

“I did,” Robert says with a mock serious nod. “I think it’s set for take off once this party’s over.”

Aaron tries to hide his smirk with his hand, but he thinks he mostly fails. It’s flattering, it’s _nice_ , to be the focus of someone’s attention that way – he tries to pretend those sorts of things don’t matter, but they do. He’s never really had a lot of it.

“I’m Aaron,” he feels the need to say. He’s at a masquerade ball, there’s supposed to be some mystery, but he’s never felt more exposed. Or _seen_. “I’m a mechanic, and I prefer dogs and I – I’m seeing someone. Sort of.”

“Sort of,” Robert repeats with a tone. “Sounds serious.”

“Hey,” Aaron starts, but Robert puts a hand up to placate him.

“Sorry, sorry, just wishful thinking on my part. Look, I’m not,” Robert spins around to find somewhere to abandon his plate, coming back in so close that Aaron can smell the faint musk of his cologne. “I’m not trying to upset you here. Really. I just – well, I just wanted you to know.” 

“Okay.”

“Can I – could I leave my number? I mean, I hope you and Kevin Costner live happily ever after - ”

“Do one,” Aaron says, but he’s smiling.

“But if things change. I mean. If …” Robert rolls his eyes like he’s judging his own performance. “Could I leave my number?”

“Alright,” Aaron concedes, and he’s surprised how torn up his voice is when it comes out. How quiet. “In my phone.”

They stand huddled like that while Aaron gets his phone out, while Robert fumblingly puts the numbers in. Aaron thinks about what might happen if Liam was to walk in on this. He thinks about how they’ve never said their exclusive, never met each others friends, never talked about the real things. Whatever they are. Aaron’s got a thing for this, for rich, no-strings pretty boys.  Maybe it’s,a stupid pattern.

“Thank you,” Robert says, gently, and he’s,still so close Aaron can feel his breath cloud on his neck.

“I should…” Aaron starts to say, looking up, and biting his lip, and seeing Robert’s eyes watch the movement. They could kiss, it’d be easy, but it’d also be something Aaron isn’t. He steps back and Robert pulls his head away and the moment’s gone.

( _For now_ , he thinks.)

“It was nice to meet you, Aaron,” Robert says with a small smile, and hearing his name on those lips does something pathetic to his stomach.

“You too,” Aaron says, but Robert’s already disappearing through the crowds.

When he looks down at his phone, he snorts.

Robert’s left his contact as _Gordon Ramsay_.


	10. knocking on the wrong door au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A man answers the door sopping wet and looking frazzled and Aaron just knows his morning's about to get worse.

Aaron presses the doorbell with his elbow, trying to keep the parcel aloft and scratch at his itchy nose. He’s carted the thing half way across town, fighting off a dog, a toddler, and a delirious bloke who was rambling something about worms (though it might have been bikes, Aaron’s French is pretty rusty) – all he wants to do is drop it and run.

When a man answers the door sopping wet, and shouts, “Do you speak English?” over the sound of rushing water coming out of his apartment – Aaron feels like this morning is (somehow, almost impossibly) about to get worse.

“Uh, yeah?”

“Quick, get inside.”

Going inside is the absolute last thing Aaron wants to do. He’d rather face off that dog again than go inside. But he needs a signature on the delivery slip, because he needs to get paid, because he needs to eat something that isn’t butter and bread for the first time this month. He goes inside.

“Bloody hell!” is the only thing he can think to say when he gets into the man’s kitchen. There’s water bursting from the sink, roaring loud and flooding everywhere – the man hurriedly trying to clear everything from sight. “What happened?”

“Do I look like I know that?” he yells, and if Aaron wasn’t having The Worst Day™ he might suppose the two of them shouting at each other is actually kind of comical.

“You’ve gotta turn it off!”

“Right, yeah, ‘cause I’ve been stood here with my hands on my hips waiting for some halfwit to come tell me that!”

Aaron decides just to fume quietly. “Call someone, then!”

“I called them! It was too loud and I didn’t understand them and I think they might be sending someone but I can’t – it’s - ”

It’s the poor bastard’s face that does it. He looks at his kitchen like Ed used to look at the TV when his team lost, and Aaron can’t deal with that. He’s such a soft touch. He pulls off his jacket, and rams up his sleeves, and reminds himself that in the grand scheme of things – when he’s miles from home, and he can’t go back, and he just broke up with his boyfriend on top of it all – getting a little wet isn’t that bad.

Or, well, a lot wet.

“You got a spanner, or a wrench or something?” 

Shocked and relieved, the man springs into action. “Uh, I think so, let me check.”

When he comes back he pulls out a box that he’s clearly never opened in his whole life. Aaron finds a few random tools that might work and a small towel off the bench and just throws himself onto the floor, giving in. He’s a mechanic, by trade, not a plumber, but he’s kind of hoping the general idea’s the same. Right tighty, lefty loosey.

It works. Aaron’s clothes are completely soaked through, and the denim of his pants are already chafing, but with a bit of strain he manages to get it all shut off. He hears the man in the background cursing gratefully.

“Look, Mr. Bellerose,” Aaron says as he stands up, literally swishing water off his bare arms. “If you could just - ”

“I’m not Mr. Bellerose,” the man cuts in, and when Aaron looks over he realises the man is serious. He’s ridiculous – with his hair every which way and his white t-shirt clinging to his chest – but he’s serious. Aaron feels suddenly sick.

“But – what – “ Aaron scurries over to where he’d dropped his things, scanning the piece of paper. “Mr. Bellerose. Rue Lainerie - ”

“This is Rue _Lanterne_. My name’s Robert Sugden.”

“Fuck.” 

Robert scoffs, grabbing a handful of his t-shirt to squeeze out all the water. “Yeah, no kidding. Look, I’m sorry that you -”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Aaron says again, ignoring him, and he literally has no energy left to do anything else but slump onto the nearby sofa.

“Don’t sit down!” Robert cries, his arms out and all but leaping over. “Why would you - ”  

“ _Seriously?_ ”

“I’ll get a towel or something, some dry clothes - ”

“You’re just - ”

Robert heaves Aaron up off the sofa – examining it a bit closer he realises it does look sort of classy – and pushes him down a pokey little hallway. There’s not much on the walls, and it’s extremely tidy, to the point that when they get into the bedroom it can only be described as bare. A bed, a side table, and a wardrobe with a few bits and pieces on top. That’s all.

“Just, stand there,” Robert tells him – orders him – before sticking his head into his wardrobe. “It might all be a bit small for you.”

“Better than wet,” Aaron says with a shrug, then feels a little chill coil up his spine. The suns still high, and there’s a lot of light coming through the windows, but it’s cool in here. He’s relieved when Robert’s stepping over to pass him some sweatpants and a shirt.

“These might be okay.”

“Thanks.”

“I should be saying thanks,” Robert says, stepping back a little. He runs a quick hand through his hair a few times, flicking some water about. He’s fit, sort of ethereal, with his pink lips and fair skin and – Aaron ducks his head.

“Right, well – are you gonna stand there and watch me or?”

“Oh, sorry.”

Instead of leaving the room, like Aaron was hoping he’d do, Robert just turns around to face the wall. Aaron’s a little distracted with the cut of his hips, and the curve of his arse, that he doesn’t move until Robert starts to talk again. _Shit._

“Have you been here long? France, I mean?”

“’bout eight months.”

“Right. Couriering long?”

“Uh, no, I – I worked at a garage but it closed down.”

“A mechanic,” Robert says, as if it’s a revelation, and starts to turn just as Aaron’s pulling on his pants. He quickly spins back, his smile falling, Aaron can see a flush in his neck. “Sorry, sorry, uh – right, a mechanic. That makes sense.”

“I guess.”

“I uh – I only flew in a few weeks ago.” That explains the bare house, Aaron thinks. “Thought’d be the opportunity of a lifetime but mostly it’s just been _bollocks_.”

“It’ll get better,” Aaron says, as if he’s any expert on the matter. He’s not going to tell some stranger – who’s obviously got problems of his own – that France had only been good for one thing and that one thing was already out shagging other blokes. “Uh, thanks. For this.”

Robert turns - a little slow, hesitantly – and smiles at Aaron for the first time since he walked in here. It’s a little disarming.

“Like I said, it’s me who should be saying thanks. Maybe I could call your work? Explain the situation?”

“Oh, um, yeah. That’d be great. I’m gonna be late back and I… yeah I can’t afford to make any mistakes right now.”  


“Well, consider it done.”

“Ta.”

They shuffle back through the house, Robert putting Aaron’s wet clothes in a bag for him while he gets his parcel and papers together. They chat a little about where they’re from, and what they miss, and it makes Aaron a little homesick. Whether that’s for England, or for something else, he’s not sure. 

Aaron gives Robert his name, the contact details for the place he works, and it’s a weird feeling as Robert walks him to the front door. Like he’s forgotten something.

“Thanks again,” Robert says as Aaron heads outside. He’s still standing there in wet clothes, his feet bare, drops of water on his throat that Aaron keeps tracking with his eyes.

“No problem. I’ll see ya round.”

Aaron’s hardly made it ten feet down the road, wrestling with the parcel and trying to think up a credible story to tell his boss later – when Robert calls out to him and he swings back around. He looks so stupid rushing out of his house, but he’s smiling, and he’s _gorgeous_ , and Aaron just feels a little waylaid.

“What’s  - ?” he starts to ask but Robert just quickly tells him,

“Delivery fee,” with a smirk and he’s taking Aaron’s face in his hands to press a kiss to his mouth. It’s so warm, despite everything, so soft and sweet and funny, and when Robert pulls away Aaron can’t help his dazed grin. 

“You’ll have to see me,” Robert says, starting to walk backwards, and Aaron almost feels like there’s some invisible strings, like he’s being pulled with him. He fights the feeling. 

“Oh yeah?"

“Yeah! I want those pants back!”


	11. pretending to hate each other au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robert's trying to settle down roots in Emmerdale. Aaron's trying to pretend he doesn't care.

Robert has a dark freckle just below his left hip.

He has one on his throat, and one on his arm and one on his inner thigh that Aaron likes to nuzzle at to hear the breathy little sounds Robert makes before whining for more. Aaron got a marker to them once, drew a line from one to the other to another, until Robert was a writhing, groaning mess, torn between his frustration and his arousal.

 _Drawing the sky_ , Aaron had told him teasingly when he’d demanded to know what Aaron was doing, _look, you’re stars and space and all_ , and it was foolish, dumb, but that was the way Robert made him feel. So dumb.

“Robert alert,” Adam mutters into his beer, the two slumped into a corner table at the Woolie. It had been a hard day at the yard, a hard _week_ , and Aaron hardly knew which way was up.

“What?” he says through the fog, looking over in time to see Robert approaching their table. Bloody hell, Aaron thinks, he’s wearing a suit. _Bloody hell_. “Oh.”

“Fellas,” Robert says with that infamous smirk. Aaron’s not sure if it’s the fatigue or the pint talking, but Robert seems more at ease today. Less like he’s trying to walk through broken glass. Or chew on it. “Before you start, I’m just here to see Vic.”

“What for?”

“Not that it’s any of your business,” Robert says to Adam’s cutting scowl. “But I have a proposition for her.”

“Oh, no, tell me you’re not buying into this food van idea.”

“And why not?”

“Because we don’t have the funds, mate, or the time.”

“That’s where I come in.” 

Aaron bites at his thumb as he watches the scene – not just because of the tension between them, but also because he can’t be trusted to say anything that’s not, _you look fit today, fancy a meet up later?_ Robert keeps throwing him glances, and licking his lips, and it’s his idea to keep this quiet but it’s also always him doing the teasing.

Aaron takes a gulp of his beer.

“Right.”

“This could be big for her. As someone who,claims to love her, I would’ve thought you’d be supporting her.”

“I will!” Adam protests, suddenly red faced. “When the time’s right. And trust me, man, if it means taking your money and lookin’ at your face every day, the time is definitely not right, yeah?”

“I’ll tell her you said that when she’s raking in the cash,” Robert grits out, and then he’s heading for the kitchen without a single glance back.

Adam punches Aaron in the arm. “Thanks for the back up!”

“Ow! What the flipping - !”

“Nice one, mate, real helpful.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“Anything!” Adam cries, before slumping back into his glass. “Smarmy prick. All he’s done since he got here is rile every one up. Andy, Katie, me. What’s he still doin’ here, anyway? There’s nothin’ for him here.”

“Apparently there is,” Aaron says quietly, and he means Vic, mostly, Diane. Remnants of the family Robert could have had, once, that might still have if he plays his cards right. (Aaron had told him that he wasn’t playing them well at all, and Robert hadn’t talked to him for almost a week before crawling back into his bed and saying sorry with his hands, with his mouth, with everything but his words.)

“I don’t wanna see Vic get used like this, man.”

“You don’t reckon he’s genuine?”

“No. You _do_?”

“I donno. I don’t - ” Aaron catches the way Adam’s looking at him, the anger, and it makes him feel a little sick and it spurs him out of his chair. “Whatever. You want another?”

“Yeah, go on.”

Aaron leaves the order with Diane and escapes out to the back. He’s tired – tired from work, tired _of_ work, tired of sitting on his hands and watching everything happen to everyone else – he just wants to rest. He splashes his face and takes a few breaths and runs into, Robert coming through from the kitchen.

“Alright?”

“Do one,” Aaron bites out, watching Robert’s teasing smirk slowly start to waver.

“Relax, mate, there’s no one around.”

“I’m not your _mate_ , don’t - ”

“Aaron,” Robert says, softer this time, and it says a lot about Aaron’s state that he allows Robert to get him pushed into a dark corner, flat against a wall. “Is this about Adam, because I - ”

“It’s about a lot of things, Robert,” Aaron says, and he knows this is getting old. This fight. Aaron’s thrown a pint in Robert’s face, and Robert’s drudged up Aaron’s past in public, and Aaron’s cost Robert a good chunk of his salary defacing his stupid car he’s so proud of. It’s ugly, and it becomes blurred – how much is for show and much is honestly fuelled by their frustration? 

Why is it so hard to just be them?

“I’m serious about this thing with Vic.”

“Good for you.”

“I want to make a real thing of it. I want to…” 

Aaron searches his face for the rest. For the same flicker of truth he gets when they’re alone, stripped bare, where no one else can see them. He knows that Robert well. “You want to what?”

“I want to be part of something. Here. I want to stay.”

“You want me to keep lying.”

Robert huffs a little. It ghosts warms over Aaron’s face. “I’m trying here, Aaron. What you said to me, when you told me I was messing up - ”

 “Robert - ”

“It made me mad, sure, but only because you were right. I wanted to believe that I was the victim, that it was _their_ fault my life turned out the way it did but… I know that’s not entirely true. I know I gotta meet them half way.”

“Okay.”  


“Do you - are you with me? I mean, I’ve gotta take it one step at a time but - are you…”  


“I’m tired,” Aaron admits, and his head swings back to thump on the wall. Robert doesn’t look defeated, and doesn’t cast his eyes away. He takes all of Aaron in just as Aaron had done to him. Aaron shivers.

“You go up,” Robert finally says. “I’ll tell Adam and then you and me – we’ll talk about it tomorrow, okay?”

“If you’re just gonna fob me off - ”

“I won’t. I - ” Aaron sees the flickering look Robert throws over his shoulder, but he lets it go. He lets it go long enough for Robert to get his mouth on Aaron’s, to get a hand up and a thumb out, stroking his cheek. It’s so soft, and simple, and it’s the first time in all those months that he’s felt like there’s something else just beyond the now.

Something more.

“Tomorrow.”


	12. co-stars au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The relationship wasn’t real, but all the attention was. All the ratings were. That award is.

Aaron’s two beers in and still shockingly sober.

The award is heavy in his hands, and the guilt sloshes hard in his gut – but he won, apparently. That had been the whole point, hadn’t it?

“Try to look less like someone killed your dog,” Robert says through gritted teeth as he approaches. His head ducks in close, and he gives Aaron a warm smile, and _shit_ , Aaron thinks. _He really is a great actor_. “You’re a bloody winner, remember?”

“Yeah. Funny, that.”

“This was as much your decision as it was mine.”

“I know that.”

“Then what? What is the fucking problem?” 

“I’m wonderin’ how much longer I have to pretend to be in love with ya,” Aaron bites back, a little shake of his head. “ _Babe_.” 

He thrusts the award into Robert’s chest, forcing him to take it, before pushing his way through the suit-and-tie crowds. Robert’s right, it _was_ his decision – not his idea, no, and probably not a decision he will ever forgive; but he agreed. Like he agreed to stay on with the show, like he agreed to talk openly about his sexuality, like he agreed to be Mr. Pin Up, Mr All That’s Good And Right With The World.

Just like all of that, he also agreed to date Robert Sugden. Mr Unpopular.

The relationship wasn’t real, but all the attention was. All the ratings were. That award is.

“Aaron,” a voice calls out, grabbing at his elbow, and he’s relieved to see Ed standing there offering him another beer. He takes it, the pair shimmying around tables to find a quiet place to stand, Aaron tipping back his bottle with some desperation.

“Ta, mate,” he says with a sigh of relief, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand. “Feel like I’ve been hit with a truck.”

“You mean _by_ a truck?”

“Oh god, not you and all?” Aaron mutters, smiling at Ed as he laughs. He’s new to the cast, and mostly keeps to himself, but he seems to get along with everyone. He seems to fit in a way Aaron’s always struggled with. “I just made a speech, didn’t I? Sounded alright, yeah?”

“Top notch, mate. I was impressed.” 

“Yeah, right.”

“So where’s Rob?” Ed asks, and Aaron bites down on the sudden impulse to say, _it’s Robert, he doesn’t like Rob_. Christ. What has he become? “You two are usually joined at the hip.” 

“Yeah, he just – has some people to see,” Aaron tells him, rubbing at his forehead. “Or whatever.”

“Everything alright?”

“Yeah, yeah, just.” Aaron sighs. There’s bubbling voices, and hooting laughter, and the constant flash of lights from somewhere in the distance. He has so many notifications, and texts, and phone calls, that he’s considering just buying a new phone. “It’s a big night.”

“You want to get out of here?” 

“Seriously?” Aaron says, scoffing, and the sight of Ed’s flushed, embarrassed cheeks is kind of endearing.

“No, no, just from one mate to another. You look beat.”

“Cheers, _pal_ , here I was thinkin’ I looked alright.”

“You do.” Ed’s endearing face suddenly turns purposeful, and his eyes sweep up Aaron’s body. “You look great.”

“Wow,” Aaron says, and suddenly he’s the one blushing. He’s practically been persona non grata with the single community since signing his status away to Robert Sugden three months ago. It’s nice to get a little attention that isn’t choreographed. “You’re really laying it on thick, tonight, you been taking classes or somethin’?”

“Alright, lads?” another voice says, suddenly joining them, and Aaron senses Robert’s hand on his shoulder before he feels it. Strong, and squeezing. Possessive. “Not interrupting, am I?” 

“Of course not, mate,” Ed says calmly, while Aaron fixes his gaze on his beer bottle. “Just thinkin’ that Aaron might wanna get out of here.” 

“What, and you’d be the one taking him?” Robert’s grinning, his voice like a huffing little laugh – but he’s not amused. He so rarely is. “Is that a joke?” 

“Robert,” Aaron warns, but Ed throws up his hands, looking almost torn between confusion and amusement.

“Hey, he said you were busy. I just thought - ”

“Do you?” Robert says, ignoring Ed and turning enough to face Aaron. He looks really good tonight – not that he doesn’t always look good – and the light catches the serious blue of his eyes. They almost look warm. “Want to go?”

This whole thing has been a lie. They have lied to their friends, to their family, to the public and their fans. They have laughed when they knew someone was watching, and they have kissed when someone wasn’t watching enough. 

But the one thing they haven’t done, the one thing they didn’t have to do, was lie to each other. And maybe that alone is what gets them through it.

“Yeah.” 

“Alright, then.” Robert’s hand that was on his shoulder is now on the small of his back, and Aaron barely gets to wave goodbye to Ed before Robert’s ushering him out. “Let’s go.”

Aaron keeps up the smiles and the thank yous and the coy, _my boyfriend and I are ducking out early_ looks just long enough to get into the car they’d arrived in and pull away from the venue. He and Robert are sprawled in the back, their award sat between them, and when they’re well enough away Aaron rips off his tie, throwing it in frustration.

“Alright, then?” he snaps at Robert, who just looks surprised. “Marked your fuckin’ territory enough?”

“Are you serious?” Robert yells back. Apparently he’s wrenched a hand through his hair while Aaron wasn’t looking, because it’s suddenly all mussed, his lips a stark red. “How do you think it looks when you’re stood there with him?”

“We were _talking_.”

“About what? The nearest hotel?”

“Yeah, because that’s all two gay blokes are interested in, right?”

“You were supposed to be there with _me_ ,” Robert growls, and it’s so fierce, so pointed, Aaron feels it like a slap to the face. “You’re _mine_.”

“You say that to me again,” he dares Robert. He has his jaw clenched tight, his fingers dug into the flesh of his thighs. “Go on.”

There’s quiet. Aaron feels short of breath, and hot, like his clothes are suddenly too tight, like there’s a sharp pressure at his temples. _The Village_ is big, they’re big – it’s the sort of thing he had waxed lyrical about when he was just a little boy. _I’m going to be on TV_ , he’d say, _and everyone will know my name_ , he’d tell them. And here he was.

But what he never thought about, what he never dreamt of, was love.

He certainly never dreamt he’d have to act that out too.

“Look, I’m sorry that this whole thing has been so hard for you,” Robert finally says, his voice gentler now if not sardonic. Aaron just scoffs.

“Oh, sure, like you’ve just had a laugh.”

“We both know who had more to lose, here.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Before you, everyone hated me.” Aaron bites down on a harsh comment regarding the fact people still hate him. “This whole thing would never have happened if it weren’t for that.”

“Yes it would have.” Robert goes to interrupt but Aaron talks over him. “I was going to leave. I wanted to head to the States, try my luck there, but they made me a better offer. A bigger offer.”

There’s a pause while that sinks in. He’d never told any one that. He wasn’t _supposed_ to tell any one that. But if Robert’s going to run around like a bear with a sore head thinking Aaron has nothing to lose by taking off and shagging the first person who flatters him, well. “You’re serious?”

“Yeah. Only, there was the one catch.”

“Me,” Robert says, and Aaron doesn’t miss the way his lips go shiny where he wets them with his tongue.

“Right. So here we are. You got something out of it, I got something out of it.”

Robert picks up the abandoned award. It’s big, despite Robert’s sizable hands, solid and shiny. It’s probably the best thing Aaron’s ever gotten, if he’s honest, and that probably makes it worse. “Like this.”

“You keep it.”

“Aaron - ” 

“Robert, don’t,” Aaron says tiredly, letting his head fall back on his seat. They shouldn’t be far from the hotel now, and while going home would be ideal at this point, fresh sheets and room service is a welcome thing. “I’m not gonna run off with some other bloke, alright? Like you said, I’m yours. At least for a while longer.”

Robert huffs again, and there’s a minute shake of his head. He looks at the award, then looks at Aaron, back and forth a few times while the tension between them builds. A crackle of something, a spark, a heat that’s actually real.

It all just feels so real.

“Mine, hey?” Robert says softly, and Aaron feels his throat become suddenly full. He feels the seat dip as Robert edges closer, the award fall at his side, a big, firm hand circle around his thigh. He just looks at Robert, head back, mouth suddenly dry.

“I don’t belong to you,” he feels the need to say, “Or to this. Us. This thing.” 

“I think we have a name, on the internet. The fans made one up.”

“Oh, God.”

“Aaron,” Robert goes on, softer now, and edging in, and yes, Aaron thinks, why haven’t they done this, why haven’t they tried this out, away from the cameras and the media and the screaming crowds? They’ve always had it, that chemistry, they’ve always _worked_. So maybe it was just too hard to know what was theirs, and what was the world’s.

“Kiss me,” Aaron tells him, and doesn’t move, and just lets Robert cover him with his mouth, his body, his strength. They have kissed, a lot, and it’s always been good – but not like this. Not with his hand tight in Robert’s hair, not with his legs open to welcome him, not with their panting breaths and their muffled words, _yes yeah, go on_.

Robert’s shaking hands are at his belt, and Robert’s telling him, “Wanted this a while, thought – didn’t think you’d want – too good for me - ” and _shit_.

“Shut up,” Aaron tells him, kissing him, running his cheeks and his nose and his lips across Robert’s own and revelling in the way Robert grins. “Just, _shut up_.”

There’s no script, now.

They’ll make it up as they go.


	13. tourist /knowledgeable local au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robert wants to sneak in another pastry before heading in to work, but some gruff looking Brit needs directions.

It’s still cool down on the street, but the sun is starting to ascend bright across his table. The breakfast crowds are starting to thicken, shuffling down the path; their lilting, bubbling voices so familiar now that Robert can just let it wash over him. He sips at his tea and pores over his paper and tries to distract himself from the tonnage of work he has coming up later today.

He thinks it deserves another pastry.

“Bonjour,” someone says in a clunky accent, casting shadows over Robert. He looks up to see a young man, all fluffy hair and crumpled clothes – and it hits him like a wave of nostalgia, just how _British_ he looks.

“Bonjour,” Robert replies, out of habit, then suddenly feels stupid. He yanks off his sunglasses to backtrack. “Uh, sorry, I mean. I speak English.”

“Oh, thank God, mate,” the guy says, huffing relief, slumping into the chair across from Robert. He has a thick beard, and pink cheeks, and he’s handsome, Robert will concede. He also looks warm and worn in, like maybe he’s been traveling for a while. “I was gonna pull out my phrase book, and that wouldn’t be pretty.”

“Right.” Robert shifts awkwardly in his seat. He knows people here, he has acquaintances, but it has been a long time since anyone has asserted themselves. He’s never known how to deal with the over familiar. “Well, can I help you?”

“Oh, uh, yeah, actually,” he says, pulling something – a map – from the back pocket of his jeans. It’s compact, and it’s marked, and Robert can appreciate that the guy is at least a little organised. “I’m looking for this, here. I donno.”

Robert looks over the map, all the symbols and words, and - while he’s better at reading French then speaking it – he’s relieved to see that it’s a place he’s familiar with. “It’s not far from here,” he tells the man, lifting an arm to swing a little to the right. “Just a few blocks that way. You can’t miss it.”

“Oh,” he looks a little embarrassed. “Weird.”

“There’s also Information Booths on every corner,” Robert says, unable to stop himself from having a dig, and the man snatches his map back, smirking.

“Shut up, there is not.” 

“Seriously, though, there’s a whole town full of locals just waiting to be of help to you.” 

“Yeah, because one more chat with _Pardon, non Francais, wee wee_ , would be mint, mate, sure” he mutters while Robert tries and fails miserably to hide his amusement in his coffee cup. “I’m Aaron, by the way.”

“Robert,” he says with a little nod.

“Been in France long?”

“Five months, give or take. You?”

“Oh, uh,” Aaron scratches at his beard. “Not long. _Bollocks_ , I can’t even remember what day it is.”

Robert huffs out a laugh. “Tuesday, last I checked.”

“Right, so. So not long.”

It’s strange to hear it said so flippantly. Robert hasn’t got a lot of anything left for him back there. An ex-fiance, a family that don’t talk to him, a string of failed business plans littered across half the country. But he still longs for it, most days, the better memories of it.

Maybe Aaron doesn’t have many.

“Are you here by yourself?”

“Um. I wasn’t. But my … my friend decided to leave early.”

“Your _friend_ ,” Robert says, a little leading, because friend sounds a lot like _a person I was dating_.

“Yeah,” Aaron says with a soft smile, rubbing at his face with a rough hand. Robert has to pull his gaze away. “So, can I – could I get you another coffee? As a thank you, or whatever.”

“Oh, uh, that sounds good but I can’t,” Robert says honestly, surprising even himself with the disappointment. It’s been a long time since he’s met someone he’s connected with – on any level really, not just the sex level. “I’ve gotta get to work.”

“Don’t tell me,” Aaron says, gesturing to Robert’s white shirt, unbuttoned at the collar. “You work in an office.”

“No, a circus.” 

Aaron makes a chuffing sound, mock disappointment. “Damn, that was my next guess.”

“Well, good luck finding that place that’s really easy to find,” Robert teases, sliding on his glasses and gathering his things.

“Good luck with the acrobats,” Aaron teases right back, getting slowly out of his chair only to lean over and nab a pen Robert had been using. He also pulls up a napkin, and starts scribbling something down on it, Robert trying not to watch the pull of muscle in his arms, his shoulders. “And hey, I’ll be around for a little while, maybe… Well maybe you’ll let me say thank you, properly.”

He hands Robert the napkin, his gaze solid and heated and _Oh,_ Robert thinks, _so it is that kind of connection._

“Alright,” is all he gets out, and then he just sits there and watches Aaron shuffle on down the road.  

“You see Aaron, yes?” one of the waiters says to Robert, breaking him from his reverie. 

“Uh, yes? You know him?”

“Sure! He usually come in, says hello.”

“He’s staying around here?”

“Stay? Yes,” the waiter says with a confused frown, while Robert tries to act nonchalant, sipping at his coffee like this isn’t the best news he’s had since he got here. “Live. One year now.” 

“ _One year_?” Robert shouts, and it’s a miracle he doesn’t tip his drink all over himself.

“Oh, uh, more? I think.”

Robert looks furiously down at his napkin, only to see that he’d been right and Aaron _had_ left his phone number, a messy scribble. _S’il vous plait_ , had also been added at the bottom, and a winking face, and _that cheeky little shit_ , Robert thought.

He didn’t want directions.

He wanted _Robert_.


	14. ghost and living person au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Should I schedule my being dead for a better time?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings for robert being a ghost and aaron being in a relationship with an omc - just in case it's not your thing x

Aaron’s had a rough week.

He comes home slamming doors, slamming drawers, getting out his art tools like they’ve personally offended him. He works until the sun sets, until the once huge expanse of shocking white is unrecognisable and his hands and forearms are splattered with colour. Reds and whites and greys, streaks of yellow that he thinks he might have scrunched in his hair.

“This looks chipper,” a familiar voice rings out across the apartment, and Aaron holds onto a breath, feeling hot with anger.

“Robert, not now.”

“Oh, sorry, should I schedule my being dead for a better time?”

Robert’s suddenly there, dull and grey in front of Aaron, but Aaron just pokes a brush through him and he disappears like smoke.

“Do one,” he says, pointlessly, before pressing his hands and forearms up against the canvas, smearing and circling and making deep lines. He pushes and pushes like maybe he’s the one who can just go through, like he can dematerialise for a while, and leave the world behind.

“What’s happened?” Robert says when he returns, peering at Aaron over the top of the easel.

“Nothing.”

“Did he hurt you?”

“ _No_!” Aaron shouts, finally looking Robert in the eye. He has more colour now, which seems to happen the more time he spends at this level, the more time he spends with Aaron. But being conscious – _zoning in_ , as Robert calls it – takes a lot of his energy. “I just – I needed some space, so I’m doing this.”

“This is space?” Robert says disdainfully, scrunching up his face as he drifts in behind Aaron. “It looks like roadkill.”

“Cheers.”

“Other people who need space go drinking, or go running, or - ”

“What do you know,” Aaron snaps at him, and he’s up off his stool, his palette crashing to the floor. “You’re fucking _dead_.”

“Oh that’s nice, that is!” Robert bites back, following Aaron over to the kitchen where he’s pulling a beer from the fridge. “I’m just trying to help!”

“By what? Being a pain in my arse?”

“I’m going to ignore the obvious joke there,” Robert mutters, and Aaron’s still too mad at him to dignify that with a response. Even if he would find it funny. Robert’s smirk falls. “What’s wrong with you?”

“I don’t know!” Aaron shouts, but realises that his anger is quickly morphing into something else. Something more like defeat. “I’m just – Christ, look at this,” he walks back closer to the painting, throwing his arms out. “You’re right. It looks like roadkill.”

“I was only - ”

“I haven’t done anything meaningful in months, I haven’t made friends since I moved in here and found out you were haunting it, I haven’t - ”

“You have Tom.”

“Do I? Jesus, Robert, he has no idea what I’m like - ”

“You won’t give him the chance to!”

“You don’t know - ” 

“Stop using the fact I’m dead against me, alright? I was alive, remember? I do know what life was like.”

Aaron remembers. After the first time Robert appeared, it took a lot of convincing for Aaron to believe Robert wasn’t a figment of his imagination. That he wasn’t finally going crazy, making up some fit bloke with a dry wit and a penchant for flirting. But Robert had been able to tell him everything. His full name, where he was born, where he lived and where he died.

He was able to tell him about the fiancé he’d left behind, and the closet he’d been hiding in, and all those material desires that had never amounted to anything.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry!” Robert yells, but it sounds more like an echo, never hitting the walls. “ _Stop being sorry_. Your life is not an apology for someone else. Your life is just for you.”

They’ve had a lot of these moments, sad and hollow. A lot of wishing they could reach out and touch, clasp a hand around each others shoulder, or hug. A lot of wishing that life was different – or had been different – a lot of wishing that was getting them nowhere. That was making them stagnant.

There’s a sudden rapping on the door, but their eyes stay locked on each other.

“Aaron,” a voice calls, and it’s Tom.

“I missed out on a lot, Aaron,” Robert says softly, even though they’ve discovered no on else can hear him. “I missed out on _this_. Meeting a bloke, dating a bloke, giving it a shot. Just try, please? Just, be yourself.”

“Robert.”

“Be _you_. I like _you_.”

Robert leaves him with a soft smile, Aaron watching until there’s nothing left but the haze of where he was. Tom keeps knocking, and calling out, and part of Aaron is tempted to just let it happen. To just go to bed and wait it out because that would be so much easier.

But he’s going to wake up tomorrow – he _wants_ to wake up tomorrow – and what will he have to show for it?

“Hey,” he says, when he finally answers the door, Tom’s hand half way up as if he was preparing to knock again. His long hair is all mussed, his shirt half tucked into his skinny jeans, and Aaron wants to make fun of him but he can’t. He’s _beautiful_.

“Hi.”

Aaron just steps aside, motioning with his head for Tom to come in. He hasn’t been into the apartment yet – Aaron always made Tom take them back to his place – but they’ve been outside it. They’ve kissed goodnight on that very doorstep.

“Wow,” is the first thing Tom says, spotting the painting in the corner of the room. Aaron feels his whole body go hot, digging his hands into his pockets.

“You know I paint.”

“Well, sure, because you said so. Not because you showed me.”

“I don’t – no one really gets to see.”

Tom turns to look at Aaron, his expression softening. He does this thing where he flicks his head, to move his hair, and it makes Aaron feel ancient. Even if Tom’s only a few years younger than him. “I’m flattered.”

“That’s not - ”

“I know,” Tom says, placating, and he’s smiling and Aaron’s done for. If only Robert could see the grouchy, woeful suffering artist now. “It was a joke. I’m pretty funny.”

“Who told you that?”

“My mum.”

Aaron lets out a breathy laugh, and shakes his head. A habitual thumb comes out to stroke at an eyebrow. The last time they’d spoken Aaron had been mean, had snapped about something so stupid he can’t even remember now. But Tom does this, he keeps doing this, he keeps xoming back. To Aaron. “You want a drink?”

“So I can stay?”

“Yeah?” Aaron says quietly, and he’s not sure who started moving first but they’re slowly inching closer, Aaron’s feet scuffing on the floorboards. “Don’t you want to?”

“That’s why I’m here.”

It’s a tentative kiss, at first. Aaron’s fingers tangle in Tom’s hair, their toes kick, their tongues sit heavy and wet in each other’s mouths just waiting for forward motion. It doesn’t take long. They twist and thrust and Tom’s fingers dig into Aaron’s back, his mouth open and his breaths like static, just a hot crackle that Aaron feels like an ache.

There’s noise. A rumbling groan, and a desperate gasp, and Aaron wonders about Robert, about what he might see and what he never got to have – how he made all the difference in Aaron’s life, for whatever that was worth.

(He wonders if he’ll see Robert again. He doesn’t think so. At least not for a while.)

“No drinks?” Tom says teasingly as Aaron entwines their fingers and pulls him towards the bedroom. He’s shaking warm and so turned on and they’ve still got a lot to learn about each other. They’ve still got a long way to go.

But Aaron’s here now. He’s not going to keep pushing him away. 

“I want you,” he says, getting Tom on his back and crawling over him, and feeling him, strong, beneath his hands.

“You’ve got me.” 


	15. falling in love with their best friend's partner au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robert and Gabe have been best friends for 22 years. 
> 
> Then Gabe meets Aaron Dingle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is mostly aaron/omc, with a lot of pining and brief aaron/robert.

Robert’s known Gabe since they were six years old. They played footie together at school, on the back oval by the old, rusty portables - and while neither of them were ever good enough for the team, they always had each other to big themselves up. All _get in_ , and _Leeds_ _material you are_ , and stupid childhood dreams.

They finished school together, came out together – Robert can still hear Gabe’s horrified “No we’re not shagging, he’s like my brother, gross!” – stepped into the workforce together. They did everything together, and it was effortless.

It took twenty two years, and about twenty something weeks for anything to ever threaten their friendship.

His name was Aaron Dingle.

  


(“Robbie, Robbie,” Gabe had slurred to him one night, despite the fact Robert had sworn a life time of pain to any one who ever called him that. “I met a man.”

“I’m chuffed for you, really,” Robert mocked. “Was it a special man? Did he do tricks?

“No, no, _a man_ ,” Gabe reiterated, holding out his hands as if he was trying to hold something heavy. “He’s like, all muscle and hair and this frown, bollocks, you should see the bastard _frown_ , Rob.”

“Really? That’s all you got? Not great at blowjobs or a brilliant shag - ”

“ _Excuse you_ ,” Gabe had squawked, and the sound had surprised Robert. The offence was new. “We haven’t done anything like that, yet.”

“Wow. It must be serious.”

It was.)

  


Robert met Aaron on a Friday, in one of their local pubs. He was quiet and self effacing and when he bit at his bottom lip it did something horrible and hollowing to Robert’s chest. He’d never liked Gabe’s _type_ before, never thought much beyond the obvious - is this a good bloke, a decent bloke, will he treat Gabe like Gabe deserves?

Aaron’s different.

Aaron can drink them under the table. He can talk about football like he’s talking about religion, and he can say just one thing, one small, sly thing, that has Robert laughing until his eyes water. He has shoulders, and meat, and hair that’s soft in the mornings. He has awful taste in music and will fight Robert on it, his chin out and his glare steady.

Gabe passes out on Aaron’s lap one night, snoring drunk, and the two of them eat a whole cheesecake together and talk about their lives. About the empty spaces where their families used to be and the people that plugged all the holes. About the funny stuff, and the weird stuff, and the men they’ve known, and loved, and lost. They talk until the sun’s coming up, until Gabe’s nuzzling at Aaron’s tummy, until Aaron clears his throat like it hurts and says, _I should probably get this one to bed_.

It’s all downhill from there.

(“What do you mean you don’t want to go out?” Gabe had demanded over the phone, Robert parked on the couch in a ratty tee and trackies. “This is the third time this week!”

“I just can’t, mate,” Robert had said with a sigh, pinching at his eyes and feeling his lip tremble. “Too much to do tomorrow, y’know?”

“What, like washing your hair, sweetheart? Don’t be daft.”

“I’m serious, Gabes, I – I have to go.”

When his phone buzzed a little while later, it wasn’t Gabe. It was Aaron.

 _Come on. He misses you._ )

  


It’s the wine, that does it. The swish stuff their friend Becky had gotten wholesale, passing him a bottle with that knowing look of hers. He hadn’t told her – he hadn’t said it out loud – but he supposes she knows. She’s smart like that. He disappears to somewhere quiet, a little step out the back of the house, and he’s almost got the whole bottle finished before Aaron finds him.

“Are you serious?” Aaron asks, with a little laugh, and Robert presses the heel of his hand into his eyes.

“Fuck off.”

“What are you doing out here?” he goes on, and he presses himself next to Robert on the step, and he yanks the bottle away from him. “The party’s inside.”

Robert laughs when Aaron takes a swig of the wine and promptly pulls a face. He’s a beer guy, almost strictly, though he doesn’t mind a scotch on a special occasion. Robert had bought him an expensive brand, for his birthday, and the look they shared when he opened it almost felt like he’d given the game away.

“ _Pillock_.”

Aaron elbows him. “Twat.”

“Go back,” he says, and he doesn’t mean for it to sound so desperate. But it is. They’re too close and it’s too familiar and Robert isn’t dealing with that right now. He needs distance. “I’m fine.”

“Gabe’s not. He’s looking for you.”

“Gabe’s fine. He’s got you, doesn’t he?”

There’s silence, while Aaron pins him with a look. Even in this low light, just a golden hue across his face, Robert can see his frustration. “Is that what this has been about? You’re jealous of me?”

“Come on, Aaron,” Robert snaps, because Aaron’s not stupid. Why does he act like it? “You know - ”

“What?” 

“I’m not jealous of you.” Robert turns enough to look him straight in the eye, their knees twisting and their breaths clouding in the air. “I’m jealous of _him_. _I want you_.”

It might have happened in some ridiculous way, some farcical way that Robert’s dreamed up. He might kiss Aaron and Aaron might kiss him back and Gabe might catch them. It might all blow up in their faces until all that’s left is him and Aaron facing what they’ve done. But it doesn’t. It’s quiet.

Aaron lets him press their mouths together, gently, before pushing him, gently, before saying, “Don’t,” gently and getting up to leave. Aaron’s always been gentle with Robert.

  


(“We’re good, aren’t we?” Gabe had asked for the third time in five minutes. Robert had finally caved, had finally agreed to breakfast, just the two of them, and just the sight of Gabe – the stupid beard he was trying to grow, that sparkle in his eye – had felt like coming home.

“Always.”

“Good, good,” he’d said with a laugh, clapping hands on Robert’s shoulders, pulling him close, enveloping him in a hug. Robert breathed into his neck. “I need to tell you something.”

“Alright?” he asked worriedly, lifting an eyebrow, but Gabe had just waved at him, shaking his head.

“No, no, nothing bad, I’m just – I’m thinking about asking Aaron to move in with me.”

Robert had felt his stomach drop to the floor, had coughed and smiled and tried to hide his sadness with surprise. “Oh, right, that’s – when?”

“Donno. Becks is having that thing next week. Maybe then?”

“Alright, well, be sure.”

“Sure?” Gabe had said with a laugh, and his face was lit up, and he knew. “It’s Aaron, innit?”

“Yeah,” Robert conceded. It was Aaron.)  
  


Gabe’s message comes through the same time Aaron’s standing at Robert’s door with red eyes and a fierce look. He barely has time to glance at it, thinks maybe he sees, _broke up_ , before Aaron has him slammed against a wall, his hands balled up in Robert’s tee.

He’s only seen this side of him once.

But it was at a pub, and to a stranger, and they’d been mouthing off about Gabe.

“Why, Robert?”

“I’m sorry,” he splutters, on instinct, his phone clattering to the floor. “What – what’s?”

Aaron kisses like he’d rather be punching, rough and stinging. Robert’s hands scramble to find purchase at his hips, to claw at Aaron just to make sure that he’s real. They shouldn’t, they can’t, but Aaron’s so near. He’s so firm, and so warm and Robert’s so weak. He always has been. He’s never been the good guy.

“I can’t do this with you,” Aaron say when he breaks the kiss, their foreheads pressed together and his eyes closed. “We can’t do this. Not like this. Not now.”

“I know,” Robert says, and his hands find their way to Aaron’s face, his neck. He wants to commit it all to memory.

“Go to him. He needs you.”

“Yeah. I will.”

They kiss again, and slow it down – all slick heat and grazing lips and a fierceness, a longing. It’ll happen – Robert feels like it _has to_ – but not today. Not tomorrow. Not for a long time, he bets, and not before Gabe is ready. Anything else would be selfish. Anything else would break his heart, would break _them_ , and Robert’s willing to give up just about everything for Aaron.

But he won’t give up Gabe.

“I love you,” he finally says, and it feels like the glass around his heart breaks, it feels like he can finally breathe.

“I know,” Aaron tells him, and presses a kiss to his cheek. He’s gone.


	16. the soulmates au.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Robert's soulmark appeared when he was eight.
> 
> But that's not how it's supposed to work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one I did for myself, rather than a request! It's really long, so I linked it here from tumblr.
> 
> Warnings for brief descriptions of 'off-screen' bullying/violence.

Robert’s mark came in when he was almost eight. 

He’d had his hair grown out at that stage, curling at his neck, so he’d known the moment it happened. It itched, it burned, hell it even _thrummed_ ; before Robert couldn’t take it any more and demanded his mum cut all his hair off. 

“You’ll have to wear these, love,” she’d told him sadly, passing him shirts with high collars, and scarves. She’d spared him the reasons - the _this isn’t how soulbonds are meant to work_ , and _the other children will be awfully cruel_.

She’d spared him the truth, but he’d known.

“It’s wonderful,” she’d whispered into his newly cut hair, all smiling light in her eyes. “It’s truly wonderful, Bobby.”

It clenched at his heart like an oath.

*

The mark wasn’t extraordinary. Small, and pale, just a jagged square missing corners and a circle of splintered tree branches entwined. Robert had spent days staring at it in the mirror, spent days touching it and poking at it and half wishing it would just disappear. 

It didn’t.

He got older, and he got found out, and it wasn’t half as bad as he thought it was going to be, but it wasn’t great either. Soulmates found each other by chance, by fate, they _earned_ it. Sometimes it was immediate, and sometimes it was a slow burn, but it was always just by a sense of knowing.

Not by a picture on your skin. 

His mum said it was fireworks, and Andy said it was just plain fire, but his grandmother had told him it was like the first sip of tea in the morning. It was like knowing the rest of your life was about to start.

Robert liked that one the best.

*

“Why don’t you just go and find them,” Vic had yelled at him when he’d come home from school with another black eye and blood nose. She’d been on at him for years about putting it on the internet, or in the newspaper, or anything – but he’d refused.

He wouldn’t let that be his story.

“No.”

Vic threw an icepack at him. “How many people have soulmarks?”

“Not many,” Robert grumbled with his head down.

“Less than not many, Rob, seriously? I bet it won’t take long before - ”

“I don’t care. That’s not – that’s not how it’s supposed to happen.”

“Oh that’s _bollocks_. Just because it’s different doesn’t mean it’s wrong, God, listen to yourself!”

“No, _you_ listen to me, Vic,” he shouted back, getting off the couch and throwing the icepack away. “All I ever hear is, you’re a cheat, you’re a liar, what d’you know about love, what d’you know about soulmates?”

“Robert - ”

“Well it’s true. I’m not prancing about expecting things to go my way. If it happens, it happens, _end of_.”

He’d ignored her calling after him, and he’d ignored his mum’s fussing later on. He ignored, and ignored, and ignored, until no one talked about it any more.

Not in support, not in spite. Nothing.

*

Robert fell in love when he was twenty. 

Beth, was her name, with a face splashed with freckles and long red hair that she always threw back in a ponytail, always had a pencil sticking out of. She was doing interior design, and she liked to walk dogs, and she could recite a thousand stupid poems at him he never knew existed.

She was special.

“Hey,” he’d groaned on instinct when they were curled up on her bed. She’d run a finger softly along his neck, and over his mark. “Don’t – you know it doesn’t like it when you touch it.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry soulmark,” she whispered to Robert’s neck, making Robert snuffle with his laughter. She’d been the first and only person who he he’d been open with about it. The first person to get drunk with him and let him slobber and cry all over her and tell her how much he hated it.

She’d been the first person to understand.

“I’m sorry soulmate,” she said then, and it was quieter, sadder, it made Robert growl and grab at her, turning her onto her back.

“Maybe it’s not a soulmark,” he said, like a demand.

“Robert - ”

“Maybe _you’re_ my soulmate, and we just don’t know it yet - ”

“I’m not, come on,”

“But I love you, you know I do - ”

“I know,” she said, and then she was hushing him, and then she was pulling him down with her hands at his bare waist, her knees up and her mouth open and helping him forget.

When she left it wasn’t because they didn’t love each other. 

It was because she was the one who stood to lose the most.

Robert wasn’t hers to keep.

*

It was just a string of flings and hook-ups, after that. Men, women, he didn’t mind – so long as it didn’t last. He finished school and started work and there was little time for anything else. Family dinners, and friendly pub crawls and the occasional shag when the time was right.

On a Friday he met Brian.

Brian was all dark skin and a big smile and this gravelly voice, this flirtatious wit. It took no convincing to get him into a taxi, or to get him upstairs to Robert’s flat, or to get him pressed against a wall with his hips, his chest, his mouth.

Robert hissed when Brian snuck a hand beneath his collar, a little “Ah, don’t,” before he could stop himself. The wince made Brian curious, peeling back Robert’s shirt, peering at it like he’d just found another head.

“Holy _shit_.”

“Yeah, I know, shocking, huh?”

The sudden space he created between them made Robert’s stomach sink. “Shit, um,”

“ _What_?”

“You should – fuck – you need to call - ” Brian scrambled over to the kitchen bench, finding a pen and paper. He was harried, a little breathless, something that Robert knew had nothing to do with their kissing. When he grabbed out his phone Robert groaned.

“If this is about seeing a Reader, don’t bother - ”

“No, no mate, that’s not it at all,” he said genuinely, pushing the paper at Robert. “Please, just. Call this number, alright? You really need to meet this bloke.”

As he started towards the front door, Robert yanked at him to stop. “But what about…!”

Brian looked at Robert with a small smile. His shirt was untucked, his hair probably looked a right mess. But Brian just shook his head. “No, I can’t – just. Tell him I gave you his number. Alright? His name – his name’s Aaron.”

*

When he was fourteen, Robert got a call from a woman in New Zealand.

Her name was June, and she knew someone who knew someone who had a kid that went to Robert’s school. She’d found out about his soulmark.

“I’m really sorry to bother you,” she’d said, her accent thick and her voice kind. “But my son, Luka, he has a soulmark.”

“Oh.”

“We wondered, maybe, if – if we could send a photo.”

Robert didn’t check the e-mails for days. It was the first time he’d been faced with the real questions. What if it is? What if it isn’t? What if he decides he doesn’t want to know either way? What if he renounces his soulmate all together? Then what happens? Nobody’s ever been able to tell him.

“You do it,” he’d told his mum, twisting the computer screen to face her and squeezing his eyes shut.

“Robert.” He’d looked at her, and he didn’t know what she was feeling. All she did was purse her lips and say, “No,” just like that.

The last he’d heard Luka had trekked over to America to find his soulmate.

But that was a long time ago.

*

Aaron’s number burned a hole in his pocket for a long time. Over a week, even, with Brian’s voice in his head, _you really need to, you really need to_. That had been his life’s motto up til that point. You really need to cover your mark. You really need to find your soulmate. You really need to bury yourself in work, and ignore and forget.

In the end he decided it had to be worth something. It had to be worth the black eyes, and losing Beth, and seeing his mother’s endless worry.

He had to try.

“Yeah?” came the gruff reply when he finally dialled the number. Robert had to sit down.

“Uh, is this Aaron?”

“Yeah?” he said, a sound of shuffling in the background. “Who’s this?”

“My name’s Robert. Brian told me to call you.”

There was silence. The far off sound of machinery, maybe, some hollering voices and that was all. Robert strained to hear. “Hello?”

“Sorry,” Aaron said quickly, coughing. “I’m here.”

Robert had tried to work out what he was going to say. He’d thought of a hundred different questions that might help, but in the end there was really only one that mattered. So he asked it. “Is this about my soulmark?”

“Yeah.” Aaron sighed, long and heavy, like he’d been holding onto it for years. “Yeah, mate, it is.”

*

They met in a corner café, on a Sunday morning. Aaron was already there when Robert arrived. He had dark hair slicked back, a full beard, and his skin flushed pink from his cheeks all the way down his neck. He was lovely, really, but that was all.

Robert thought he’d feel different.

“Hi,” Aaron said, scurrying out of his chair, and Robert nodded.

“Hi.”

“You want coffee or…?” Aaron started, and it became an awkward, muttering conversation over the top of each other, just,

“Oh, sure, I’ll - ”

“No, let me, I - ”

“Okay. Uh. Americano.”

“No problem.”

Robert sunk down into a chair and scrubbed absently at his neck. He’d worn a v-neck t-shirt and a jacket with no collar. He hadn’t wanted there to be any pretence.

“It’s on the way,” Aaron told him when he got back, sitting down across from Robert and wrapping his hands around his own mug.

“Cheers.”

There was a long moment of quiet, of flickering glances and Aaron slurping his drink and Robert trying to clear his throat and failing. “Uh, so,” he began before realising that Aaron’s eyes had locked onto his neck. From that angle he wouldn’t have been able to see the whole thing, so Robert turned it just a little.

Aaron gasped.

“Yeah,” was all Robert could think to say. Aaron was wearing a jumper that covered some of his neck, but Robert could tell that he didn’t have one. At least not in the same place Robert did.

“I – _shit_ when Brian said.” Aaron kept looking down, and then back up, as if he wasn’t sure what would happen if he looked too long. His hands shook where they were still hovering on his mug. He wiped at his brow.

“He didn’t say much to me,” Robert admitted, trying to cut the tension. “Just told me I needed to call you.”

“An’ here we are.”

“Right. So.”

“Right.”

Aaron took one of his shaking hands, and turned it palm up. There, on the meaty flesh beneath his thumb, was Robert’s mark. Was _their_ mark. Robert felt it split through his chest, like all the air was escaping from his lungs. It took all the will power he had not to reach out and pull Aaron’s hand closer to him. 

“Jesus Christ,” he said on a breath, and he felt stupid, he felt like a kid again, like it was all just a fever dream and he’d wake up and they wouldn’t have marks, and they wouldn’t know each other, and Robert would be left at the start.

“It’s the same,” Aaron said, and his eyes were on Robert’s neck. “They’re the same.”

*

They stayed at the café until they got kicked out, then went to a restaurant for dinner. They talked until Robert was hoarse from it, until he felt like he knew Aaron inside out. How his mark came in when he was three, how he’d worn gloves and sleeves with holes in them, and used his mum’s make up to cover it. How it didn’t work the same for him, as it did for Robert – how he could touch people and it didn’t hurt.

How he was sorry to hear Robert’s had.

There was nothing earth shattering about it. No fireworks, no fire. But it felt comfortable, Robert felt comfortable, in a way that he hadn’t in more than twenty years.

“We should – you think we should just, keep doing this?”

“You mean dating?” Robert asked with a little smirk, and Aaron ducked his head, smiling.

“Something like that, yeah.”

“Sure.”

They did.

They sat for meals a lot, and went for beer a lot – he began to think Aaron’s favourite pastime was beer – and they talked. They shared stories. Good ones, bad ones, ones they’d been told by other people. How soulmarks are anomalies. How soulmarks aren’t real. How soulmarks are a curse, that people with soulmarks will spend their whole life trying to find the person who has the same one as them but in reality they’re just missing out on their true soulmate.

They’d been told a lot of the same things.

“Did you always want to meet me?” Robert asked.

“No.”

“Me either. My sister used to tell me to put it up on the internet or something.”

“Ugh, my mate did too. Soft lad.”

“Yeah,” Robert said, and they locked eyes, and they smiled, and Robert felt it pulse in his throat.

They kept going for months. Just going on dates and talking themselves silent and not touching, never touching. A vague attraction turned into a heated one turned into a longing that Robert hadn’t felt since Beth. They stopped talking about their marks. They stopped talking about soulmates. But they never ran out of words, or laughter, or truths.

Until they did – until they fought.

“Just say something,” Robert yelled, so fed up, so tired of Aaron being at arm’s length.

“What? What’dya want, Robert?”

“Just – just admit you’re scared. Like I am. I’m so bloody scared Aaron.”

“Scared?”

“Scared! Scared it won’t mean anything, scared it won’t work, scared that we’ll look closer, look real close, and realise they’re not the same after all. Scared I’ll _lose_ you.”

Aaron stepped closer as if on instinct, reaching out his unmarked hand before faltering, and pulling it back. “Robert, just…”

Robert stepped forward too. He grabbed Aaron by the wrist, and pulled his marked hand close. He took a breath, whispered, “Touch me, please,” and watched Aaron’s mouth, watched his lips fall open just a little. 

Aaron’s hand shook as he reached over, shook as he splayed it out over Robert’s neck, over Robert’s mark. Robert whined, suddenly weak, slumping forward so that his forehead fell against Aaron’s. “Does it hurt?” Aaron asked, quietly, curling his fingers in just a little. 

Robert could smell him. He could smell the beer, and the oil, and something else. Something new. He could feel Aaron’s shoulders beneath his hands, and feel the shudder of his body as Robert groaned again.

“No,” he said, and for the first time since he was forced to cut off all his hair it was the truth. “Nothing hurts.”

Aaron kissed him.

*

It took another eight months and ten days for the bond to kick in.

Aaron was naked and asleep and letting out those trumpeting little snores Robert would kick him for. The sun was starting to come up, and Robert was reading the paper, and his phone buzzed on the nightstand – probably a message from Vic. Her and Adam would be on their way back from France soon.

“Aaron,” Robert said quietly, nudging him with an elbow. “Come on. Time to get up.”

Aaron just groaned. He was pulling longer shifts with Adam gone, and he had been up late for his mum’s birthday the night before, and if Robert thought he wouldn’t be angry about it later, he would have let Aaron sleep in.

“Aaron, come on.”

Aaron groaned again, but this time he rolled over. Robert just watched the play of muscles in his shoulders, his arms, his chest. He just watched while Aaron brought his hands up to wipe at his face, to run through his hair, to blink blearily at the clock as if it had deeply offended him.

“Thanks,” he grumbled, reluctantly, throwing the sheet off to get up.

“Don’t forget - ” Robert started to say, and Aaron leant back over, splayed his hand across Robert’s neck and kissed him. 

It was the same at first. Just a soft press, just a sour taste, just their usual morning kiss that Aaron always liked to do, always in the same way. Except slowly it simmered. Slowly he felt it trickle out across his body, felt it simmer, felt it fizz. Slowly it was just their open mouths and catching breaths and something else altogether.

A story no one had told.

“Wow,” Aaron said on a breath, pressing their foreheads together.

“I was gonna say don’t forget your watch,” Robert said. “But that was better.”

Aaron chuckled. “I thought – I didn’t think - ”

“Yeah, I know.”

They’d been told their whole lives it wasn’t the same. They wouldn’t have it. They didn’t _earn_ it.

“I found you.”

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr.](http://thefancyspin.tumblr.com) Thank you so much for all the positive feedback on these. It's been a total delight.


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